Symmetric and Unsymmetric Balanced Incomplete Block Designs: A Comparative Analysis

This paperdiscusses a comparative analysis on balanced incomplete block designs by using the classical analysis of variance (ANOVA) method. Fortunately, the data collected for the analysis were in two groups of the balanced incomplete-block designs (BIBD’s), that is, symmetric, and unsymmetric (BIBD’s). In this paper, the basic interest is to apply classical ANOVA on the two types of BIBD’s and check whether they are significant and also minimizes error. A secondary data from N.R.C.R.I, Umudike, Abia State was used. To achieve this, we shall consider treatment (adjusted), block (adjusted) treatment (not adjusted) in the classical ANOVA method on the available data. Though, symmetric balanced incomplete block design (SBIBD) and unsymmetric balanced incomplete block design (USBIBD) are significant, it is pertinent to note that the SBIBD classical ANOVA method is found to be preferable to the USBIBD with reference to their variances at different level of significance.