The Administration of Your University/college Is Thinking About Implementing a Policy

Essay

The administration of your university/college is thinking about implementing a policy of
coed floors only in dormitories.Currently there are only single gender floors.One reason
behind such a policy might be to generate an atmosphere of better "understanding"
between the sexes.The Dean of Students (DoS)has decided to investigate if such a
behavior results in more "togetherness" by attempting to find the determinants of the
gender composition at the dinner table in your main dining hall, and in that of a
neighboring university, which only allows for coed floors in their dorms.The survey
includes 176 students, 63 from your university/college, and 113 from a neighboring
institution.
(a)The Dean's first problem is how to define gender composition.To begin with, the survey
excludes single persons' tables, since the study is to focus on group behavior.The Dean
also eliminates sports teams from the analysis, since a large number of single-gender
students will sit at the same table.Finally, the Dean decides to only analyze tables with
three or more students, since she worries about "couples" distorting the results.The Dean
finally settles for the following specification of the dependent variable:
GenderComp=|(50%-% of Male Students at Table)| Where "| $| Z |$ " stands for absolute value of $Z$ . The variable can take on values from zero to fifty. Briefly analyze some of the possible values. What are the implications for gender composition as more female students join a given number of males at the table? Why would you choose the absolute value here? Discuss some other possible specifications for the dependent variable.