Contingency Tables, Chi‐Squared Test, and Fisher's Exact Test

This chapter analyses the data sets for which the chi-squared test and Fisher's Exact Test are the right tests to use. It focuses on the manual chi-squared test for a table with p rows and q columns and determine levels of statistical significance using the chi-squared table. The chi-squared test calculates the difference between what is observed and what would be expected if the null hypothesis were true. Fisher's Exact Test is performed manually for 2 × 2 contingency tables. Fisher's Exact Test is exactly that: it yields avalue for P that is the exact probability of observing a table with a given set of observations, given themarginal values. The chapter illustrates the function and statistical options using the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) data files. It shows SPSS output for chi-squared analysis in Crosstabs.