The Maths Education Study

Your colleague is conducting an intervention to help alleviate anxiety around mathematics. They collect a sample of students with different educational backgrounds; those who exited high school before year 12; those who completed a maths course in year 12, and; those who completed any level of tertiary education that involves some amount of mathematics. Your colleague measures their anxiety toward maths prior to the intervention (Week 1), and then they all engage in a targeted anxiety-reducing maths intervention. Anxiety is measured again at the conclusion of the intervention (Week 2).

Question: Assuming the ANOVA result is significant, how many planned comparisons would be required to test the following Hypotheses:

H1: That all participants will display significantly lower anxiety after the intervention (Week 2) as compared to before the intervention (Week 1).

H2: That Tertiary-educated participants will display significantly lower anxiety than Under Year 12 (H2a) and Year 12 (H2b) participants after the intervention (Week 2).