Question

Women and children first? Here’s another table that summarizes data on survival status by gender and class of travel on the Titanic:

(a) Find the distributions of survival status for males and for females within each class of travel. Did women survive the disaster at higher rates than men? Explain.

(b) In an earlier example, we noted that survival status is associated with class of travel. First-class passengers had the highest survival rate, while third-class passengers had the lowest survival rate. Does this same relationship hold for both males and females in all three classes of travel? Explain.

Short answer

Part (a)

Part (b) No

Step-by-step solution

Part (a) Step 1. Given information.

The given table is:

Part (a) Step 2. Find the distributions of survival status for males and for females within each class of travel.

Survival Status	First Class		Second Class		Third Class
	Female	male	Female	Male	Female	Male
Survived	$\frac{140}{144}\approx 97.22\%$	$\frac{57}{175}\approx 32.57\%$	$\frac{80}{93}\approx 86.02\%$	$\frac{14}{168}\approx 8.33\%$	$\frac{76}{165}\approx 46.06\%$	$\frac{75}{462}\approx 16.23\%$
Died	$\frac{4}{144}\approx 2.78\%$	$\frac{118}{175}\approx 67.43\%$	$\frac{13}{93}\approx 13.98\%$	$\frac{154}{165}\approx 91.67\%$	$\frac{89}{165}\approx 53.94\%$	$\frac{387}{462}\approx 83.77\%$

From the above distribution, we can conclude that females' survival rate in the disaster is much higher than males.

In the first class, the female survival rate is 97.22%, and in the second class, it is 86.02%.

Part (b) Step 1. Explanation.

We can observe from the table in part (a) that the female survival rate is highest in first class (97.22%) and lowest in third class (46.06%).

However, when it comes to men, the second class (8.33 percent) has the lowest survival rate, while the third class (16.23 percent) has the highest.

As a result, in all three classes of travel, the same relationship does not hold for both males and girls.