Amity Institute of Psychology & Allied Sciences

Non parametric tests

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Modern inferential statistics

• A central topic of modern statistics is statistical inference.
• Statistical inference in research is concerned with two types of problems: estimation
of population parameters and testing of hypothesis.
• Webster tells us that the verb ‘to infer’ means “to derive as a consequence,
conclusion or probability”.
• For example: when we see a woman who wears no ring on the third finger of her
left hand, we may infer that she is unmarried.
• In statistical inference, we are concerned with how to draw conclusions about a large
number of events on the basis of observations of a portion of them.
• Statistics provides tools which formalize and standardize our procedures for drawing
conclusions.

- Siegel, S. (1956). Non parametric statistics for behavioral sciences. Mc Graw Hills: USA

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Parametric tests
It is a hypothesis testing procedure which assumes that the population of which sample is drawn can model the
normal distribution and has know set of parameters (like mean, median, standard deviation etc.).

Some conditions or assumptions for doing a parametric test (Seigel, 1956) –

• Normality: population should be normally distributed.
• Scale: variables must be measured on interval or ratio scale.
• Independence: inclusion or exclusion of any score should not affect the results
• Homoscedasticity: population should have same or know variance.

Non-Parametric tests
Sometimes the sample of a population is distribution free or, has a specified distribution but with unspecified
distribution's parameters (like mean, median, standard deviation etc.). In such situations, we use not parametric
hypothesis testing procedures.

The use of non parametric tests is recommended during following situation –

Small sample: when N is less than 30 then non parametric tests are recommended.
Doubtful normality: when population sample is not normally distributed.
Scale: when variables are measured on nominal or ordinal scales.

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Differences
Parametric
Data is normally distributed
Variables are measured on
interval or ratio scale
Results can be significantly
affected by outliers
Homogeneity of variance is
required
Mean is the assumed central
unit
Non parametric
Data is not normally distributed
Variables are measured on
nominal or ordinal scale
Results cannot be seriously
affected by outliers
Homogeneity of variance is not
required.
Median is the assumed central
unit
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Parametric and their non-parametric equivalent

Tests Scale Testing differences Testing

Associations
One sample Two sample K samples Correlation

Independent Dependent Independent Dependent

Parametric Interval or Z test, t test Independent Paired One way Repeated Pearson’s test
Ratio Scale sample t test sample t test ANOVA measure ANOVA
Non Nominal or Chi Square Chi Square Mc-Nemar Chi square Cochran’s Q Spearman’s
Parametric categorical test
Rank or Chi Square Median Test Sign Test Kruskal- Friedman’s
ordinal Wallis ANOVA