Question

Americans’ favorite sport. The Harris Poll (December 2013) conducted an online survey of American adults to determine their favorite sport. Your friend believes professional (National Football League [NFL]) football—with revenue of about $13 billion per year—is the favorite sport for 40% of American adults. Specify the null and alternative hypotheses for testing this belief. Be sure to identify the parameter of interest.

Short answer

The parameter of interest (p) is “the proportion of American adults who believes professional football is their favorite sport.”

The null and the alternative hypotheses are and H₀ : p = 0.40 and H_a : p ≠ 0.40.

Step-by-step solution

Given information

As per your friend, the proportion of American adults who believe professional football is their favorite sport is 0.40.

Specifying the parameter of interest

Here, the parameter of interest (p) is “the proportion of American adults who believes professional football as their favorite sport.”

Specifying the null and the alternative hypothesis

The null and alternative hypotheses are as follows:

Null hypothesis:

H₀ : p = 0.40

That is, the proportion of American adults who believes professional football is their favorite sport does not differ from 0.40.

Alternative hypothesis:

H_a : p ≠ 0.40

That is the proportion of American adults who believe professional football is their favorite sport differs from 0.40.