Siegel found that elderly people who owned dogs were less likely to pay visits to their doctors after upsetting events than were those who didn’t own pets. Similarly, consider the following hypothetical data. A sample of elderly dog owners is compared to a similar group (in terms of age and health) who do not own dogs. The researcher records the number of visits to the doctor during the past year for each person. The data are as follows:

Question

Siegel found that elderly people who owned dogs were less likely to pay visits to their doctors after upsetting events than were those who didn’t own pets. Similarly, consider the following hypothetical data. A sample of elderly dog owners is compared to a similar group (in terms of age and health) who do not own dogs. The researcher records the number of visits to the doctor during the past year for each person. The data are as follows: 
Control Group	Dog Owners
12	8
10	5
6	9
9	4
15	6
12	
14

a.	Is there a significant difference in the number of doctor visits between dog owners and control subjects? Use a two-tailed test with á=.05.

Joe · Accepted Answer

You want to use a two-tailed t-test. You do not want to use matched pairs.

books set things up differently, but here is one way to do it..
group 1 = dog owners group 2 = no dog

Ho: mu1 - mu2 = 0
Ha: mu1 - mu2 does not = 0

If you are allowed to use a statistics calculator (like at TI-83 or 84) you can calculate very easily by entering each group into a different column and choosing 2 sample t-test. The be sure to choose the option not =. Compare the p-value given with the .05. If your value is less, reject the null hypothesis, if not fail to reject the null.

If you are not allowed to use a stat calculator, you will have to do this by using the formulas given in your text book.