You get a free sample in the mail of a new hand lotion. The company advertises t

Question

You get a free sample in the mail of a new hand lotion. The company advertises that the product is a miracle cure for crack, weathered hands. The reading material suggests that after three applications, you will see a remarkable difference. You open the package to find only a drop of the product. It is not enough for even one application. If the sample size were large enough for one application, you might be able to infer that three applications would produce the advertised results. However, it is hard to estimate the results when the sample is so small. Also, wouldn't you get different results if your hands were never cracked or weathered? The same can be said of statistical data. The sample of data used to predict an outcome matters. Give an example of inferential statistics in healthcare (i.e., drug trials or testing on animals) and how the selection of the sample group can skew the data and what is inferred

Explanation / Answer

For the given scenario, we have to explain the importance of the sample size when we infer about the population parameters. We know that if the sample size is comparatively small, then we would get biased results and the results based on the small sample would not be inferred properly or accurately. But if the selected sample size is large enough or adequate for prediction purpose or inference regarding population parameter, then we would get the unbiased results or more approximately results for the inference purpose. According to central limit theorem and law of large numbers, we know that we get the more reliable and unbiased results when we increase the sample size. For example, animal diet product claims that the weight of certain animal increases by 2kg after the consumption of one diet or food sack. But if we only experiment this for single animal then it would not get the accurate result but if we perform this experiment for more animals then we will get the remarkable difference. We will get the increase of weight by approximately 2kg on an average.

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