Suppose Researcher A is assigned a research task to examine United States (US) companies’ financial performance and response status to the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) questionnaire in 2022. The researcher randomly chose 450 companies and collected the companies’ information from the DataStream Database. Please see the data file (Assignment 1 dataset_2023.xlsx).

• What is the population Researcher A is interested in? (1 mark)

• Identify the names and types of variables in the (1 mark)

• Use Microsoft Excel to conduct and present the appropriate graphic and descriptive results on each of the following variables: Industry, Revenue, and Direct GHG Emissions, interpret and analyze these descriptive results, and prepare a summary report. (3 marks)

• Suppose Researcher A also conducted the same research in 2019, the proportion of companies that answered CDP questionnaire was 0.72 in 2019. The researcher would like to know if this proportion of companies answering CDP questionnaire has increased. You are required to: (4 marks)
  • Establish the null and alternative hypotheses
  • Identify the appropriate test
  • Produce the test results using Microsoft Excel
  • Write a short report based on your analysis of results

• Suppose Researcher A also conducted the same research in 2019, and found that the average return on assets (ROA) was 0.06 in 2019. The researcher would like to know whether the average ROA has changed. You are required to: (4 marks)
  • Establish the null and alternative hypotheses
  • Identify the appropriate test
  • Produce the test results using Microsoft Excel
  • Write a short report based on your analysis of results