How Do We Perform a Paired t-Test When We Don’t Know How to Pair?

Abstract We address the question of how to perform a paired t-test in situations where we do not know how to pair the data. Specifically, we discuss approaches for bounding the test statistic of the paired t-test in a way that allows us to recover the results of this test in some cases. We also discuss the relationship between the paired t-test and the independent samples t-test and what happens if we use the latter to approximate the former. Our results are informed by both theoretical results and a simulation study.