MatStat#

Statistical testing#

Statistical testing is a formal procedure used to determine whether there is enough evidence in a sample of data to infer that a certain condition holds for the entire population.

In practice, it involves:

  1. Formulating hypotheses:

    • The null hypothesis (\(H_0\)): a default assumption (e.g., “no effect”, “no difference”).

    • The alternative hypothesis (\(H_1\) or \(H_a\)): the assertion you want to test (e.g., “there is an effect”).

  2. Calculating a test statistic from the data that summarizes the difference between what is observed and what is expected under the null hypothesis.

  3. Determining a p-value, which tells you the probability of obtaining a result at least as extreme as the observed one, assuming the null hypothesis is true.

  4. Making a decision:

    • If the p-value is below a predefined threshold (commonly 0.05), reject the null hypothesis.

    • Otherwise, do not reject it.

Statistical testing is widely used in scientific research, quality control, medicine, and many other fields.

Check more on statistical testing on the corresponding page.

Central limit theorem#

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The formulation of the central limit theorem is:

Let’s take \(N\) independent values \(x_i\) drawn from the same distribution with expected value \(\mu\) and standard deviation \(\sigma\).

We denote their sum as:

\(S_N = \sum_{i=1}^N x_i\)

The central limit theorem states that \(S_N \sim \mathcal{N}(\mu N, \sigma^2 N)\) — that is, \(S_N\) follows a normal distribution with mean \(\mu N\) and variance \(\sigma^2 N\).

Check more details in the corresponding page.