ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the authors deal with variables that are categorical in nature and thus are nominal or ordinal in terms of measurement scale, or have been collapsed from higher level variables into nominal or ordinal variables. They also deal with concepts and procedures for testing inferences about proportions that involve the chi-square distribution. The authors aim to define a proportion as the percentage of scores falling into particular categories. They examine in greater detail the concepts related to tests of proportions. For instance, the proportion of individuals who support a particular political candidate might be of interest. The authors consider an example to illustrate use of the test of two independent proportions. In the first inferential testing situation for proportions, the researcher would like to know whether the population proportion is equal to some hypothesized proportion or not.
