Question

A statistics class at a large high school suspects that students at their school are getting less than 888 hours of sleep on average. To test their theory, they randomly sample 42 of these students and ask them how many hours of sleep they get per night. The mean from the sample is x^ˉ =7.5 hours. What is an appropriate ending to their alternative hypothesis?

a) H_a: The average amount of sleep students at their school get per night is less than 888 hours.
b) H_a: The average amount of sleep students at their school get per night is equal to 888 hours.
c) H_a: The average amount of sleep students at their school get per night is greater than 888 hours.

Answer 1

The appropriate ending to the alternative hypothesis is (c) H_a: The average amount of sleep students at their school get per night is greater than 888 hours.

Step-by-step explanation:

The appropriate ending to the alternative hypothesis is (c) H_a: The average amount of sleep students at their school get per night is greater than 888 hours.

When we suspect that the average amount of sleep is less than a certain value, the alternative hypothesis will state that the average amount of sleep is greater than that value. In this case, since the class suspects that students are getting less than 888 hours of sleep on average, the appropriate ending to the alternative hypothesis is that the average amount of sleep is greater than 888 hours.