BEA603 Economics and Statistical Analysis

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BEA603 Economics and Statistical Analysis Semester 1, 2020
Group Assignment General Information and Submission Instructions
Please note: In previous semesters students would typically start forming groups
and working on the group assignment in week 3 and submit in week 9. To
accommodate students who have been affected by COVID-19 travel bans and
quarantine, we have moved this back by 3 weeks. (i.e start working in week 6 and
submit in week 12). If any other changes need to be made you will be informed by
MyLO announcements and by email.
The objectives of this assignment are to evaluate your knowledge and ability in:
1. Recognising and articulating appropriate business/economic questions using
a real world example.
2. Selecting appropriate variables, applying relevant descriptive and inferential
statistical techniques, to explore evidence related to the business/economic
questions.
3. Communicating clearly in a written report the business/economic questions,
statistical results/Excel outputs, and business or policy advice.
You are required to form a group consisting of 3 or 4 students to complete the
assignment. Groups of 5 or more are not allowed. If you are thinking of having a group
of 5 more, you will need to divide into two groups. It is your responsibility to find
your own group members. You could approach other students from lecture and
tutorial classes, or use the ‘Communication Discussions (Social Café)’ tool on MyLO
to look for your group members. The search process can sometimes take time and
hence it is important for you to start your search early.
 Students who are in a situation that would make groupwork difficult may request
to attempt the project as an individual or as a pair.
 There is no requirement for team members to be from same tutorial class, or
even from the same delivery mode (on-campus vs online).
 All teams (even teams of 1 or 2) are required to register. A registration form will
be posted on MyLO is week 5.
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Task Description: The assignment consists of 4 sections. Follow all the instructions
provided to complete the requirements for each section.
Due Date/Time: Monday, 18 May 2020 / 4pm AEST.
Total Marks: 100.
Weight: 20% of final marks.
Submission Requirements and Procedures
1. Combine your group assignment cover sheet and your report (including your
survey questionnaire) into a word document, and then save it as a pdf file.
2. Submit the pdf file via the ‘Assessments -Assignments’ tool on MyLO by the
due date/time shown above.
3. Only one submission is required from each group.
The Survey and its Questionnaire: Information/Instructions
1. You are required to conduct a simple survey to collect your own data. It is
important that you design a survey questionnaire that meets the requirement
of your study objective.
2. For your reference, a sample of survey questionnaire is included in this
document (see pages 6 and 7). Note that you are not allowed to duplicate or
modify this survey in any manner. Your assignment will not be assessed
should you fail to follow this instruction.
3. A clear understanding of your study objective will enable you to identify the
most important/relevant variables with ease. This implies that inclusion of
irrelevant or unnecessary variables may adversely affect your score.
4. Although probability sampling is preferable compared to non-probability
sampling, due to time constraints, you are allowed to collect your data using
convenience sampling.
5. In terms of sample size, it is strongly recommended that you survey 80-100
individuals. You may choose any method to administer your survey (face to
face, telephone, mail out, online – including social media and dedicated online
survey tools such as Survey Monkey.)
6. Ensure that you include a sufficient number of categorical and numerical
variables in your survey for meaningful analysis. It is expected that most
surveys would have at least 10 variables, but no more than 15.
7. Your survey questionnaire must be presented at the ‘Appendix’ section of your
report.
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Some Guidelines for Completing your Report
In general, you are required to communicate your business/policy questions,
statistical findings and recommendations for decision making in a written report.
Ensure that your report contains the following components and details:
Title
• State the title of your study. It should clearly reflect the core of your analysis.
[Mark: 1. Length: Around 8-12 words.]
Section 1: Introduction
Explain:
• Your (assumed) role in a private or public organisation (e.g. product
development manager in a household appliances company or a policy officer
in a government agency.) [Marks: 3. Length: ~40-60 words.]

• Why this study is important. How the findings from this study could help inform
business decisions and/or policy. Ideally you will support your reasoning using
at least one reference (for example: news, magazine or newspaper item, or
academic journals, or text, etc..).
[Marks: 12. Length: ~150-200 words.]
Section 2: Survey Questionnaire and Procedure
• Present your survey questionnaire in the ‘Appendix’ section of your report.
The number of questions in your questionnaire should be between 10 and 15.
This implies that you must consider only the most important questions that
meet your study objective. It is difficult to put a word limit for a questionnaire
and hence your questions and answers should be clear and concise.
[Marks: 4.]
• Describe how you tested your survey questions before you ran your survey
and any key learnings you gained from this. [Marks: 3. Length: 60-100 words.]
• Describe how you collected your data, and why you collected it in this way.
[Marks: 3. Length: 60-100 words.]
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Section 3: Data Presentation and Analysis
• It is essential that you demonstrate your ability in applying the knowledge
you learnt from Chapters 2, 3, 4 and 9 using your survey data. Specifically,
you are required to present and analyse the important and relevant
variable/s using:
• A summary table. [Diagram: 1.5 marks. Discussion: 2.5 marks. Length:
40-60 words.]
• A contingency table. [Diagram: 1.5 marks. Discussion: 2.5 marks. Length:
40-60 words.]
• A chart which shows the frequency of values for a variable. (eg pie or
column or bar chart, etc) [Diagram: 1.5 marks. Discussion: 2.5 marks.
Length: 40-60 words.]
• Three different chart types which show the relationship between two
variables. Ideally one of these should feature two categorical variables,
one should feature two numerical variables, and one feature a mix. Your
discussion of the relationship between two numerical variable should
include an interpretation of the correlation coefficient.
[Diagram: 4.5 marks. Discussion: 7.5 marks. Length: 120-180 words.]
• Conditional probability – Show your calculation.
[Discussion of result obtained: 4 marks. Length: 60-100 words (excluding
calculation)].
• Hypothesis testing – State your assumption(s) about the population
parameter and show your calculation.
[Discussion of results obtained: 6 marks. Length: 60-120 words (excluding
calculation)].
[Note: Ensure that you discuss each of your Excel output/result in an interesting, accurate
and meaningful manner. You only need to produce one item for each of the dot points,
but are free to produce more than one, if you feel that this adds significant value for the
reader. Remember, it is important not to clog up the report with trivial content.
Also Note: For each graphic or table you use in the report, try to think about the message
first. “What is the message I want to get across to the reader, what is key take out I want
them to have?” … and then ask yourself, “what is the table/graphic that best helps
communicate / support / illustrate this message?”. This is a far superior approach to
“I’ve got a pretty chart, what can I write about it?” ]
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Each of your charts and discussions must be relevant to the key objective of your study
and contribute to the reader’s ability to make informed business decisions. That is, don’t
waste time on something that is trivial and unimportant to the reader.
Section 4: Conclusion
• Comment on the implications of your findings for business or policy decision
making. (i.e. the “so what”.) Note that this section should not be used to
simply repeat the discussion of results.
[Marks: 10. Length: 120-180 words.]
• Comment on three limitations of your survey (e.g. variables selection,
measurement of variables, sampling method etc.)
[Marks: 10. Length: 120-180 words.]
• For future studies, make suggestions on improvements that address each of
the limitations. Support your suggestions with three relevant references from
your BEA603 resources (text, videos, supplementary slides, tutorial content,
or suggested readings).
[Marks: 14. Length: 150-200]
Appendix
• Survey questionnaire.
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