Question

A survey was done by a shoe manufacturing company before making a shoe specifically for jumping. Approximately 40% of $3000$ respondents said they would purchase these shoes over regular tennis shoes. Based on the study, the company concludes that 40% of shoe store customers shopping for tennis shoes would purchase their new product. Why is this not a valid conclusion?

• A. The study was too small to draw any conclusions about the larger population.
• B. The data from the survey does not represent the whole population because it was not conducted across the whole country
• C. The data from the survey likely underestimates the number of people interested in the new product because it only compared the new product to tennis shoes, not all types of shoes
• D. The data from the survey likely overestimates the number of people interested in the new product because the survey targeted respondents already interested in athletics.

Answer 1

Answer: (D)

The data from the survey likely overestimates the number of people interested in the new product because the survey targeted respondents already interested in athletics.

The respondents in the survey were already inclined towards athletics. However, in case of a store, it is not necessary that the customer visiting the store is interested in athletics. Hence the data from the survey may have overestimated the number of people.