Final answer:
In a one-way ANOVA test with three groups and 18 total observations, the degrees of freedom for the F statistic are 2 for the numerator (number of groups minus one) and 15 for the denominator (number of observations minus number of groups).
Step-by-step explanation:
The question involves determining the degrees of freedom for the F statistic in a one-way ANOVA test. The F statistic compares the variance within each group to the variance between the group means.
There are two types of degrees of freedom in an ANOVA test: the numerator degrees of freedom and the denominator degrees of freedom. The numerator degrees of freedom is equal to the number of groups minus one. In this case, since there are three types of credit cards (MasterCard, Visa, and Discover), we have 3 - 1 = 2.
The denominator degrees of freedom is equal to the total number of observations minus the number of groups. With 18 credit card sales and three groups, the denominator degrees of freedom is 18 - 3 = 15.
Therefore, the degrees of freedom for the F statistic in this ANOVA test are 2 for the numerator and 15 for the denominator.