Questions:
1. Rick Santorum, a candidate for the 2012 Republican nomination, claimed that “62 percent of kids who go into college with a faith commitment leave without it.” [Source: http://bit.ly/A77XED] What is being explicitly compared here? Is it a longitudinal or cross-sectional comparison? If 62 percent is the “part”, what is the “whole”?
2. Of people with diagnosed with high blood pressure in recent study, 46.2% were obese, 31.1% were overweight, 19.3% were of normal weight, and 17.2% underweight. What do we need to know to know how much obesity is associated with higher blood pressure than average?
3. Look at the graph below (from here), then answer the following questions:
- Redraw this as a pie chart or set of pie charts.
- Most smokers start smoking before the age of 18. This data was compiled from a telephone survey of people 18 and older. A statistician points out that if the survey had surveyed only people 25 and older that both the no college and some college might have had fewer current smokers, and more former smokers. Why does she say that?
- Given the answer you came up with above, why might the effect of having a college degree on reducing current smoking be slightly exaggerated?
