Aproduction managercan use hypothesis testing to test assumptions and theories. These assumptions are tested against evidence provided by actual, observed production data. A statistical hypothesis is a statement about the value of a population parameter that we are interested in. Hypothesis testing is a process followed to arrive at a decision between 2 competing, mutually exclusive, collective exhaustive statements about the parameter's value.

An industrial seller of grass seeds packages its product in 50-pound bags. The production manager is responsible for ensuring the packages contain the amount of product they are supposed to. As part of routine quality assurance, the production manager randomly samples a batch of 9 bags to determine if the bags of seed are properly filled or not.

Review the weight of the samples in the following table. You may also view thesample weightsin Excel, if desired.

Sample	Weight (pounds)
1	49.5
2	45.6
3	46.7
4	47.7
5	47.6
6	48.8
7	50.5
8	48.6
9	50.2

Respond to the following: What is the hypothesized mean in this example?