Plastic waste, particularly microplastics in oceans and waterways, has become an increasing global environmental concern. The article “Environmentally Relevant Concentrations of Microplastic Particles Influence Larval Fish Ecology” (Science, 3 June 2016: 1213–1216) describes an experiment in which fertilized egg strands of European perch were placed in 15 identical tanks. Tanks were then randomly assigned 

(1) No microplastics,

(2) A “typical” microplastic concentration (10,000 particles/m³), or 

(3) A high concentration (80,000 particles/m³). After a three-week period, the successful hatching rates were recorded for every tank; the data appears below.

Does the data provide convincing statistical evidence that microplastic level has an effect on the success rate of eggs hatching for European perch? Test at the .01 significance level.

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Microplastic level None Typical High 95 86 85 Hatching success rate 98 96 92 93 88 87 74 86 77 97 91 83