SECI 2143 PROBABILITY & STATISTICAL DATA ANALYSIS : PROJECT 2

            For the course Probability and Statistical Data Analysis, I was required to carry out the project 2 individually as the replacement of final exam. In project 2, I was required to do the inferential statistics which is to use a random sample of data taken from the population and make inferences about the population. First, I had to search for a suitable dataset from an online resource which includes any organization, website, and so on. However, I had a really hard time finding a suitable dataset that enabled me to do the statistical test in project 2 because it was just like trying to find a needle in a haystack. Fortunately, I had finally found out the suitable dataset for project 2 from Kaggle which is a great website having lots of public datasets for people to learn, practice, and fine-tune their data analytical skills.

            The dataset that I had found out is Framingham Heart Study, which is mainly about the risk factors of coronary heart disease. It was collected by researchers in the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute that launched this project. Since the dataset has many variables which include the gender, the age of the patients, the education, whether the patient is a current smoker, the number of cigarettes that the person smoked on average in one day, whether the patient was on blood pressure medication, whether the patient had previously had a stroke, whether the patient has hypertension, and whether the patient has diabetes, total cholesterol level, systolic blood pressure, diastolic blood pressure, Body Mass Index (BMI), heart rate, and blood glucose level and ten-year risk coronary heart disease, thus I had gone through a difficult time again in order to choose the suitable variables for the inferential statistical tests in this project.

            The aim of the project is to investigate the risk factors of coronary heart disease and increase public awareness about changing their lifestyle and having preventive treatment so that they will not suffer from coronary heart disease. Since cardiovascular diseases are the top cause of death globally, taking an estimated 17.9 million lives each year, hence it is vital for all the people to lead a healthy life so they will not put themselves at risk for heart disease just because of their unhealthy lifestyle such as smoking, lack of exercise which causes them being overweight or obese and so on. Hence, I hope that doing this project can make people realize the risk factors of coronary heart disease, thus they will have lifestyle modifications such as quitting smoking, having daily physical activity, and maintaining a healthy weight.

            Next, it came to the statistical test after choosing the suitable variables, I had chosen five out of six types of statistical tests which are hypothesis testing, correlation, regression, goodness-of-fit test and chi-square test of independence. Thus, I had widened my knowledge about the data analysis using inferential statistics and also had the chance to apply the knowledge and concepts that I had learnt in the project. Also, it has helped me to enhance my programming skill using RStudio and also data analytical skills because I have to make inferences about the population of patients using the results from the statistical tests. Furthermore, I had also learnt to draw conclusions from the results by doing all the statistical tests using the correct technique in RStudio.

            All in all, I have to say a big thank you to my lecturer, Dr. Chan who has been assisting us throughout this semester even though it was challenging for all of us during the online teaching and learning phase. Not only that, I had also gained a sense of achievement because I had managed to do the project successfully even though there were lots of problems encountered during the progress of the project. Hence, doing this project had a great impact on me to become more considerate about every step when conducting data analysis and interpretation. This experience has definitely gone a long way towards helping me to become a more analytical person with better critical thinking skills.