Ray Baxter of Medical Systems Associates (MSA) wanted to identify the determinants of patient satisfaction in nursing homes. Towards this end, he administered a survey to a stratified random sample of 122 patients in 16 nursing homes in Wisconsin. Patient satisfaction with their nursing home was captured by the Environmental Rating Index (ERI), a composite of patients' answers to 14 questions related to issues such as room size, physical layout, staff courtesy, medical care, cleanliness of facilities, food preparation etc. Table 17-4 shows the cross-classification results for ERI with each of three different variables: a. nursing home affiliation, b. whether or not the patient had made any new friends, and c. the number of friends made.

1. Perform the chi-square test of association for ERI with each of the three different variables (a, b and c), and test whether each association is significant.

1. Based on the chi-square statistics obtained in each case, can one figure out which of the three associations is the strongest?

Assume that all sample sizes are twice that listed in Table 17-4 e.g. the sample sizes will be 38, 82 and 122 for the first cross-classification table instead of 19, 41 and 61 respectively and so on.