Hypothesis

A hypothesis is a tentative statement about the world involving conjecture about relationships that are not yet verified: It is a prediction. Hypothesis testing is done to determine what is true—what would explain certain observations or phenomena. A hypothesis is an a priori statement of expectation that includes who is involved, what treatment or intervention they will be exposed to, the outcome measures to be used, and the comparison group. A good hypothesis is clear and concrete. Although the hypothesis (often denoted as H1), the prediction, is a statement of anticipated outcomes, it is actually the null hypothesis, or the negation of the hypothesis (often denoted as H 0), that is tested, not the hypothesis.