In probability theory and statistics, the chi-square distribution (also chi-squared or χ2-distribution) with k degrees of freedom is the distribution of a sum of the squares of k independent standard normal random variables. It is a special case of the gamma distribution and is one of the most widely used probability distributions in inferential statistics, notably in hypothesis testing and in construction of confidence intervals.
This is used in the common chi-square tests for goodness of fit of an observed distribution to a theoretical one, the independence of two criteria of classification of qualitative data, and in confidence interval estimation for a population standard deviation of a normal distribution from a sample standard deviation. Many other statistical tests also use this distribution, such as Friedman’s analysis of variance by ranks.
The primary use is in hypothesis testing, and to a lesser extent for confidence intervals for population variance when the underlying distribution is normal. Unlike more widely known distributions such as the normal distribution and the exponential distribution, the chi-square distribution is not as often applied in the direct modeling of natural phenomena. It arises in the following hypothesis tests, among others:
- Chi-square test of independence in contingency tables
- Chi-square test of goodness of fit of observed data to hypothetical distributions
- Likelihood-ratio test for nested models
- Log-rank test in survival analysis
- Cochran–Mantel–Haenszel test for stratified contingency tables
It is also a component of the definition of the t-distribution and the F-distribution used in t-tests, analysis of variance, and regression analysis.
The primary reason for which the chi-square distribution is extensively used in hypothesis testing is its relationship to the normal distribution. Many hypothesis tests use a test statistic, such as the t-statistic in a t-test. For these hypothesis tests, as the sample size, n, increases, the sampling distribution of the test statistic approaches the normal distribution (central limit theorem). Because the test statistic (such as t) is asymptotically normally distributed, provided the sample size is sufficiently large, the distribution used for hypothesis testing may be approximated by a normal distribution. Testing hypotheses using a normal distribution is well understood and relatively easy. The simplest chi-square distribution is the square of a standard normal distribution. So wherever a normal distribution could be used for a hypothesis test, a chi-square distribution could be used.
References
Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chi-square_distribution
