Motor Trend Report

Upon first examination, there does appear to be a relationship between transmission type and miles per
gallon wherein cars with manual transmission get better mileage (Fig 1).
Figure 1
Relationship between Transmission Type and MPG
35

30

25
MPG

20

15

10
Automatic Manual
Transmission Type
However, following an exploratory analysis (Supplementary Fig 1), it appears that this apparent relationship
may be explained by other variables. Specifically, if you examine the number of cylinders and the weight
of the car (which are known to impact mileage) in conjunction with transmission type, a more complete
picture becomes evident (Fig 2). When looking between groups with the same number of cylinders, the
only difference between automatic (am:0) and manual (am:1) are in the 4 cylinder group. But even these
differences may be due to the lower weight in manual cars.
Figure 2
Exploring Confounding Variables
am: 0 am: 1
35

30

25
MPG

20

15

10
4 6 8 4 6 8
Cylinders

wt
2 3 4 5

To quantify the relationship between transmission type and MPG, I built three nested linear models and
calculated the coefficient of transmission type for each model. The same trend can be seen in the coefficients

1
as in the graphs. As more explanatary variables are added, the coefficient for transmission type decreases to
almost zero.

model variables coefficient

Model 1 Transmission Type 17.1473684210526
Model 2 Transmission Type + Cylinders 2.56703470031545
Model 3 Transmission Type + Cylinders + Weight 0.176493157719667

I then used Analysis of Variance to determine if the models are distinct from one another. From the P-values,
it is evident that the additional variables do indeed change the model fit.

Res.Df RSS Df Sum of Sq F Pr(>F)

30 720.8966 NA NA NA NA
29 271.3621 1 449.53448 65.88411 0.0000000
28 191.0471 1 80.31506 11.77104 0.0018859

Furthermore, in plotting the residuals against the fitted values for each model, it is apparent that the range
of the residuals decreases in each model. Thus each of the additional of each explanatory variable leads to a
better fitting model.
Model 1 Model 2 Model 3
5 10

6
Residuals

Residuals

Residuals

4
2
0

0
−6 −2

−4
−10

18 22 16 20 24 10 20

Fitted Values Fitted Values Fitted Values

Executive Summary

While there is a difference in miles per gallon seen between vehicles with automatic and manual transmission,
it seems to be due to the increased number of manual cars with fewer cylinders and lower weight. As such,
after accounting for these explanatory variables manual cars only have a 0.17 increase in mpg as compared to
automatic cars.

2
Appendix

Supplementary Figure 1
4 6 8 50 300 2 4 0.0 0.8 3.0 4.5

mpg

10
4 8

cyl

disp

100
hp
50

drat

3.0
wt
2

qsec

16
vs
0.0

am

1.0
gear
3.0

1 8
carb
10 30 100 3.0 5.0 16 22 1.0 1.8 1 5