Today on “As the Fishbowl Turns…”, you (a bright young fishfood company innovator) are trying to prove to your skeptical boss that your new fishfood formulation (Fish2Whale) will be the Next Big Thing for aquarium enthusiasts everywhere.
Today on “As the Fishbowl Turns…”, you (a bright young fish food company innovator) are trying to prove to your sceptical boss that your new fishfood formulation (Fish-2-Whale) will be the Next Big Thing for aquarium enthusiasts everywhere. Specifically, you would like to show that the average growth for fish that were given Fish-2-Whale was higher than the average growth for fish that were given the generic brand (which is the control group for the test).
First you tried saying “Just look at these fish!! Don’t they look bigger to you??!!!!” However, despite your exciting use of exclamation points, your boss was not convinced.
Then you tried showing him each fish population as a normal distribution, and how they barely overlapped:
Your boss looked momentarily interested, but then he grunted something about going fishing that weekend. So now it’s up to you. You have one weekend to prove that your results hold water. You tried pretty pictures, and you tried graphs, so now it’s time for…
(drumroll)… STATISTICS!
Aside: What is a Normal Distribution?
You might like to watch this video about the Normal Distribution (http://stattrek.com/probability-distributions/normal.aspx ).