Atul N Roy Page 1

Comparison of two population proportions

Let us extend the procedure to compare two population
parameters such as population proportions.
Consider the following question.
Example 1:
To test if the proportion of likely voters, who intend to vote for
the incumbent president in the upcoming elections is different in
New York and Illinois, we are going to test the hypotheses
NY IL A
NY IL o
p p H
p p H
=
=
:
:

IL
p
is the proportion of likely voters who are intending to vote
for the incumbent president in
Illinois

NY
p
is the proportion of likely voters who are intending to vote
for the incumbent president in
New York
We are going to test this hypothesis at a 5% level of significance.
The following are the data from two (supposedly) independent
simple random samples taken in the last week of October, 2012

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% for the incumbent Sample Size
Illinois 57 1198
New York 62 554


According to the samples
57 . 0 =
IL
p

62 . 0 =
NY
p

Since the null here is no difference between the two proportions
We develop a pooled estimate based on both the samples


Note that the number of people in the sample, who are intending
to vote for the incumbent president in Illinois is
0.57*1198=683 (rounded)
Note that the number of people in the sample, who are intending
to vote for the incumbent president in New York is
0.62*554=343 (rounded)

Therefore
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5856 . 0
554 1198
343 683
~
+
+
=
pooled
p


Recall that we are testing
NY IL A
NY IL o
p p H
p p H
=
=
:
:

At a 5% level of significance
If we use the symbols
1
n
for the sample size for Illinois
and
2
n
for the sample size for New York
then the test statistic is calculated by
( )
|
|
.
|

\
|
+

=
2 1
2 1
1 1
1
n n
p p
p p
z
pooled pooled

Since, in this case, the alternative is two sided, the P_value will
be both the tails combined.
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( )
|
.
|

\
|
+

=
554
1
1198
1
5856 . 1 5856 .
62 . 0 57 . 0
z



z=-1.9755
Look at the left tail

The P_value is 2*0.024105717=0.048211434<0.05
Therefore we reject the null and conclude that there is a
difference

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Since this is a two sided test, let us compute a 95% confidence

interval for the difference for proportions in the two states.
Since z* for 95% confidence is 1.96, the margin of error is
calculated by the rule
( ) ( )
2 1
*
1 1
n
p p
n
p p
z E
NY NY IL IL

+

=

Or
( ) ( )
554
62 . 1 62 .
1198
57 . 1 57 .
96 . 1

+

= E

Or
0491 . 0 ~ E

The estimate for the difference is
05 . 0 62 . 0 57 . 0
2 1
= = p p

Therefore a 95% confidence interval is
( ) ( ) 0019 . 0 , 991 . 0 0491 . 0 05 . , 0491 . 0 05 . 0 = +

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A 95% interval does not include 0, therefore

agrees with the no difference conclusion from the
hypothesis test at 5% level of significance.

Example 2:
I (Atul) have benefited a lot from a blood pressure medication
called Losartan Potassium Tablets.
Let us use the data from the prescribing information of this
medication to test whether the incidence of Hypotension is
higher in the user of this medication as compared to the users of
placebo.
We are testing
placebo medication A
placebo medication o
p p H
p p H
>
=
:
:

medication
p
: Proportion with hypotension in the medication
group
placebo
p
: Proportion with hypotension in the placebo group
The data are given in the table below


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Losartan and
Conventional
Hypertensive
Therapy
Placebo and
Conventional
Hypertensive
Therapy
Hypotension 53 23
Sample Size 751 762


Note that
071 . 0
751
53
~ =
medication
p

03 . 0
762
23
~ =
placebo
p

0502 . 0
762 751
23 53
~
+
+
=
pooled
p

Therefore the test statistic is
( )
65 . 3
762
1
751
1
0502 . 1 0502 .
03 . 0 071 . 0
~
|
.
|

\
|
+

= z

The P_value is the area to the right of z=3.56 under the standard
normal curve.
The area to the left of z=3.56 is
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Therefore the area to the right of z=3.65 or the P_value
Is 1-0.99986888=0.00013112
Since the P_value is very small, we conclude that there is a
higher incidence of hypotension in the medication group for this
experiment.