Edexcel S3 2003 June — Question 5

Exam BoardEdexcel
ModuleS3 (Statistics 3)
Year2003
SessionJune
TopicHypothesis test of a normal distribution

5. A scientist monitored the levels of river pollution near a factory. Before the factory was closed down she took 100 random samples of water from different parts of the river and found an average weight of pollutants of \(10 \mathrm { mg } \mathrm { l } ^ { - 1 }\) with a standard deviation of \(2.64 \mathrm { mg } \mathrm { l } ^ { - 1 }\). After the factory was closed down the scientist collected a further 120 random samples and found that they contained \(8 \mathrm { mg } \mathrm { l } ^ { - 1 }\) of pollutants on average with a standard deviation of \(1.94 \mathrm { mg } \mathrm { l } ^ { - 1 }\). Test, at the \(5 \%\) level of significance, whether or not the mean river pollution fell after the factory closed down.