1. An economist wants to determine whether average price/earnings (P/E) ratios differ for firms in three industries. Independent samples of five firms in each industry produced the following results after conducting a one-way ANOVA. SSB (sum of squares between groups) = 258.82 and SST (sum of squares total) = 424.04. Based on this information, what statistical decision should be made when testing whether average P/E ratios differ in three industries at the 5% level of significance? Assume that P/E ratios are normally distributed.

   	a.	Reject the alternative hypothesis.
   	b.	Accept the null hypothesis.
   	c.	Do not reject the null hypothesis.
   	d.	Reject the null hypothesis.