--- title: "Introduction to cochranSize" output: rmarkdown::html_vignette vignette: > %\VignetteIndexEntry{Introduction to cochranSize} %\VignetteEngine{knitr::rmarkdown} %\VignetteEncoding{UTF-8} --- ```{r, include = FALSE} knitr::opts_chunk$set(collapse = TRUE, comment = "#>") ``` ```{r setup} library(cochranSize) ``` ## What is Cochran's formula? Cochran's formula estimates the minimum sample size needed for a survey to achieve a given margin of error at a given confidence level: $$n_0 = \frac{z^2 \, p (1-p)}{e^2}$$ Where: - `z` is the z-score for the desired confidence level (e.g. 1.96 for 95%) - `p` is the estimated proportion of the population with the attribute of interest (use 0.5 if unknown — the most conservative assumption) - `e` is the desired margin of error (e.g. 0.05 for +/-5%) If the population size `N` is known and relatively small, a finite population correction is applied: $$n = \frac{n_0}{1 + \frac{n_0 - 1}{N}}$$ ## Basic usage By default, `cochran_sample_size()` uses a 95% confidence level and a 5% margin of error — but these are only defaults, not fixed assumptions. Every parameter can be set explicitly: ```{r} cochran_sample_size(e = 0.05, conf.level = 0.95) ``` ## Known finite population ```{r} cochran_sample_size(N = 2000, e = 0.05, conf.level = 0.95) ``` ## Custom confidence level, margin of error, and expected proportion ```{r} cochran_sample_size(N = 500, p = 0.3, e = 0.03, conf.level = 0.99) ``` ## Using the underlying functions directly ```{r} n0 <- cochran_n(p = 0.5, e = 0.05, conf.level = 0.95) n0 cochran_n_adj(n0, N = 1000) ``` ## Comparing confidence levels and margins of error ```{r} settings <- expand.grid( conf.level = c(0.90, 0.95, 0.99), e = c(0.05, 0.03, 0.01) ) settings$n0 <- mapply(cochran_n, e = settings$e, conf.level = settings$conf.level) settings$n0 <- ceiling(settings$n0) settings[order(settings$conf.level, -settings$e), ] ``` As the table shows, tightening the margin of error or raising the confidence level both increase the required sample size — margin of error has the larger effect, since it is squared in the denominator.