Question: when do you use a 2 sample t test

title: Student's t-test
text: A typical example of the repeated measures t - test would be where subjects are tested prior to a treatment , say for high blood pressure , and the same subjects are tested again after treatment with a blood - pressure lowering medication . By comparing the same patient 's numbers before and after treatment , we are effectively using each patient as their own control . That way the correct rejection of the null hypothesis ( here : of no difference made by the treatment ) can become much more likely , with statistical power increasing simply because the random between - patient variation has now been eliminated . Note however that an increase of statistical power comes at a price : more tests are required , each subject having to be tested twice . Because half of the sample now depends on the other half , the paired version of Student 's t - test has only n / 2 − 1 degrees of freedom ( with n being the total number of observations ) . Pairs become individual test units , and the sample has to be doubled to achieve the same number of degrees of freedom . Normally , there are n − 1 degrees of freedom ( with n being the total number of observations ) . 

Answer: answer: A typical example of the repeated measures t - test would be where subjects are tested prior to a treatment and the same subjects are tested again after treatment.  By comparing the same patient's numbers before and after treatment, we are effectively using each patient as their own control.  Pairs become individual test units.