You are conducting a significance test on patients' blood. You are testing for cancer based upon whether or not the white blood cell count is higher than a given threshold. The threshold is your null hypothesis while your alternative hypothesis is that the patients white blood cell count is greater than the threshold. If the alternative hypothesis is accepted (rejecting the null) the diagnosis is that the patient has cancer.

a) Describe what would constitute a Type I error in this context.

b) Describe what would constitute a Type II error in this context.

Question

You are conducting a significance test on patients' blood. You are testing for cancer based upon whether or not the white blood cell count is higher than a given threshold. The threshold is your null hypothesis while your alternative hypothesis is that the patients white blood cell count is greater than the threshold. If the alternative hypothesis is accepted (rejecting the null) the diagnosis is that the patient has cancer.

a) Describe what would constitute a Type I error in this context.

b) Describe what would constitute a Type II error in this context.

anonymous · Answer

What exactly are you asking @farkas?