Discrete

Random
Variable
Review and Preview
• In previous lessons observed sample data to construct
frequency distributions

• In this lesson, we use the possible outcomes of a procedure

(determined using the methods of Chapter 4) along with the
expected relative frequencies to construct probability
distributions, which serve as models of theoretically perfect
frequency distributions.
Random Variables
Random Variables

Random Variable is a variable (typically represented by X) that

has a single numerical value, determined by chance, for each
outcome of a procedure. Random Variable is denoted by
CAPITAL letters.
Discrete Random Variable

random variable

X=Number of ice cream a customer order

Number of Customers P(X=x)

Ice Cream
1 78 0.634
2 20 0.163
3 15 0.122
4 4 0.033
5 4 0.033
6 2 0.016
TOTAL 123 1

Melanie
 Why we called it Random Variable?
Because it can take any value
For Example:
P(X=1) = 0.634 P(X=5) = 0.033

Number of Customers P(X=x) Number of P(X=x)

Ice Cream, x Ice Cream, x
1 78 0.634 1 0.634
2 20 0.163 2 0.163
3 15 0.122 3 0.122
4 4 0.033 4 0.033
5 4 0.033 5 0.033
6 2 0.016 6 0.016
TOTAL 123 1 TOTAL 1
Which of the following are other possible random variable from
the same scenario?

Number of customers who arrive in Random Variable

the next hour
Number of customers who pay in Random Variable
Cash
Number of days in which the store is Random Variable
close due to rain
The flavor topping the customer NOT a Random Variable
chooses
Which Municipio is the customer NOT a Random Variable
from
The method that customers uses to NOT a Random Variable
pay
Continuous Random Variable

Weight of the Ice Cream How long it takes to

serve a customer?

How long it takes to

scoop an ice cream?
Discrete and Continuous Variable
• Discrete: has either a finite number of values or a countable
number of values, where “countable” refers to the fact that
there might be infinitely many values, but they can be
associated with a counting process, so that the number of
values is 0 or 1 or 2 or 3, etc.
• Continuous: has infinitely many values, and those values can
be associated with measurements on a continuous scale
without gaps or interruptions.
Example: Decide which of the following procedure is discrete
random variable, continuous random variable or neither.

Procedure Discrete or Continuous or Neither

The weight of newborn babies. Continuous

The number of cats in a shelter at any
Discrete
given time
The weight of a book in the library. Continuous
The types of book in the library. Neither

The number of books in the library. Discrete

The grade given to a student, as a letter. Neither
The grade given to a student, as a Continuous
percentage.
The height of students in a class Continuous

Number of planets around the Sun Discrete

Probability Distribution

A probability distribution is a description that gives the

probability for each value of the random variable. It is often
expressed in the format of a graph, table, or formula.
Number of P(X=x)
Ice Cream, x
1 0.634
2 0.163
3 0.122
4 0.033
5 0.033
6 0.016
TOTAL 1
 Probability Distribution
Function

0.700
How likely is that the next
customer will just buy 1 ice
0.600
cream?
Probability, P(X=x)

0.500
P(X=1) = 0.634
0.400

0.300

0.200
Out of 50 customers, how
many would you expect a
0.100
customer to buy more than
0.000
1 2 3 4 5 6 3 ice cream? 4
Series1 0.634 0.163 0.122 0.033 0.033 0.016
Number of Ice Cream a customer order (X)
P(X>3) =P(X=4)+ P(X=5)+ P(X=6)
= 0.033+0.033+0.016
=0.082
Requirements for a Probability Distribution
• σ 𝑃 𝑋 = 1 : where X assume all possible values. The sum of all
probabilities must be equal to 1 or 100%

• 0 ≤ 𝑃 𝑋 ≤ 1: for every individual value of x. (That is, each

probability value must be between 0 and 1 inclusive.)
Example:
1. Suppose you are rolling two dices and you want to get the sum of
the number facing upwards. Construct a probability Distribution
X 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

P(X) 1/36 2/36 3/36 4/36 5/36 6/36 5/36 4/36 3/36 2/36 1/36

0.18
0.16
What is our random variable? 0.14
0.12
X=sum of the face up dices 0.10

P (X)
0.08
0.06
0.04
0.02
0.00
2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
Sum of two Dices
2. Suppose that you buy a raffle ticket for $5. If 1,000 tickets are sold
and there are 10 third place winners of $25, three second place
winners of $100 and 1 grand prize winner of $2,000, construct a
probability distribution table.

𝑋 $25 $100 $2000

𝑃(𝑋)
Mean, Variance and Standard
Deviation of discrete probability
distribution
Mean, Variance and Standard Deviation

Mean
• Recall: when we calculate the mean from a frequency
distribution table, we use the formula
σ 𝑓. 𝑥 σ 𝑓. 𝑥
𝜇= =
σ𝑓 𝑁
Where 𝑓 is the frequency and N is total number of samples in
the data set. We can rearrange the equation above
𝑓
𝜇 = ෍ 𝑥. = ෍ 𝑥. 𝑃(𝑥) = ෍[𝑥. 𝑃(𝑥)]
𝑁
𝜇 = σ[𝑥. 𝑃(𝑥)]
Variance
For similar reason as when we derive variance in previous lesson, the
variance for probability distribution function is then,
𝜎= ෍ 𝑥−𝜇 2 . 𝑃(𝑥)

𝜎2 = ෍ 𝑥 − 𝜇 2 . 𝑃(𝑥)

Although the equations above is easy to understand, but it will not be so

easy when performing the calculation, therefore when doing the
calculation, the variance formula can be rearranged as:
𝜎 2 = ෍ 𝑥 2. 𝑃 𝑥 − 𝜇2

Standard Deviation
𝝈= ෍ 𝑥 2. 𝑃 𝑥 − 𝜇2
Example:
• Consider the offspring of peas from
parents both having the green yellow
combination of pod genes. Under these
conditions, the probability that the
3
offspring has a green pod is or 0.75,
4
that is the probability of having green
pods from 5 randomly selected peas.
𝐿𝑒𝑡 𝐺 = 𝑛𝑢𝑚𝑏𝑒𝑟 𝑜𝑓 𝑝𝑒𝑎𝑠 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑔𝑟𝑒𝑒𝑛 𝑝𝑜𝑑𝑠

Assume that a botanist has already

performed this research an represent the
probability distribution as following
Find the mean, variance and standard
deviation
 X P(X) X*P(X) (𝑥 − 𝜇) (𝑥 − 𝜇)2 (𝑥 − 𝜇)2 ∗ 𝑃(𝑥)
0 0.001
1 0.015
2 0.088
3 0.264
4 0.396
5 0.237
TOTAL

𝑀𝑒𝑎𝑛, 𝜇 = 3.75 𝑉𝑎𝑟𝑖𝑎𝑛𝑐𝑒, 𝜎 2 = 0.94

𝑆𝑡d. Dev, 𝜎 = 0.97
Identify Unusual Results
• Range rule of thumb
Similar previous rule of thumb, minimum and maximum can be
calculated from the following

𝑚𝑖𝑛𝑖𝑚𝑢𝑚 𝑢𝑠𝑢𝑎𝑙 𝑣𝑎𝑙𝑢𝑒 = 𝜇 − 2𝜎

𝑚𝑎𝑥𝑖𝑚𝑢𝑚 𝑢𝑠𝑢𝑎𝑙 𝑣𝑎𝑙𝑢𝑒 = 𝜇 + 2𝜎

• Rare Event Rule for Inferential Statistics

Unusually high number of successes: 𝑃 𝑥 𝑜𝑟 𝑚𝑜𝑟𝑒 = ≤ 0.05

Unusually Low Number of successes: 𝑃 𝑥 𝑜𝑟 𝑙𝑒𝑠𝑠 = ≤ 0.05

Example
1. Suppose you were tossing a coin to determine whether it
favors heads, and suppose 1000 tosses resulted in 501 heads.
This is not evidence that the coin favors heads, because it is
very easy to get a result like 501 heads in 1000 tosses just by
chance. Yet, the probability of getting exactly 501 heads in
1000 tosses is actually quite small: 0.0252. This low probability
reflects the fact that with 1000 tosses, any specific number of
heads will have a very low probability. However, we do not
consider 501 heads among 1000 tosses to be unusual, because
the probability of 501 or more heads is high: 0.487.
2. Suppose a genetics company claimed that they have
developed a method for selecting baby births to be a girl.

Hypothesis:
-The gender selection method is ineffective
-The probability of baby girl being born is 50%
Study A Study B
100 births 100 births
75 girls 55 girls
25 boys 45 boys

Assume Probability of obtaining Assume Probability of having 55

75 or more baby girl is 0.001 or less baby girl is184 in 1000 or
Since the 𝑃(𝑋 𝑜𝑟 𝑚𝑜𝑟𝑒) ≤ 0.05 0.184
Reject the hypothesis Since the P(X 𝑜𝑟 𝑙𝑒𝑠𝑠) ≥ 0.05
(Gender selection method is Fail to reject the hypothesis
effective) (Gender Selection is not
effective)
Expected Value

The Expected Value of x is the sum of the products of the values of x and
their corresponding probabilities.

E(x) = x1 P(x1) + x2 P(x2) + x3 P(x3) + … + xn P(xn)

Purpose for Expected Values

1) Assists in making mathematically sound

decisions for future events.

2) Used when making investments, determining a

price for numerous services, prioritizing events,
and in calculating return on investment.
Example 1:
A third grade class was surveyed regarding the number of hours that they
played electronic games each day. The probability distribution is given
in the table below:

# of Hours (x) Probability P(x)

0 0.3
1 0.4
2 0.2
3 0.1

Calculate the Expected Value of the quantity of time that a third grader
spends each day playing electronic games.
 E(x) = x1 P(x1) + x2 P(x2) + x3 P(x3) + … + xn P(xn)
# of Hours (x) Probability P(x)
0 0.3
1 0.4
2 0.2
3 0.1

Expected value, E(x) = 0 (0.3) + 1 (0.4) + 2 (0.2) + 3 (0.1)

Expected value, E(x) = 0 + 0.4 + 0.4 + 0.3
Expected value, E(x) = 1.1 hours

Conclusion: Third graders spend 1.1 hrs playing video games each
day.
Example 2:
Find the expected number of boys for a three-child family. Assume girls
and boys are equally likely. Key: b=Boy; g = Girl

# of Boys Probability Product

8 Combos
x P(x) x P(x)
bbb
bbg 0 1/8 0
bgb 1 3/8 3/8
bgg
2 3/8 6/8
gbb
gbg 3 1/8 3/8
ggb
Expected Value: E(x) =0 + 3/8 + 6/8 + 3/8
ggg = 12/8 or 1.5 boys

Concl: The expected # of boys for a 3-child family is 1.5 boys.

Example 3:
Finding Expected Winnings
A player pays $3 to play the following game:
Win $7 by rolling a 6 on a single die,
Win $1 by rolling any other number.
What are the expected net winnings for the game?

Number Payoff Net P(x) x P(x)

1, 2, 3, 4, 5

6
Finding Expected Winnings
A player pays $3 to play the following game:
Win $7 by rolling a 6 on a single die,
Win $1 by rolling any other number.
What are the expected net winnings for the game?

ANS: The player will not have an expected net winning for the game,
since his Expected Value is a loss of $1.00.
 Example 4:

Imagine you are businessman, and your company just developed new
cake products. Assume your cake product is as good if not better than
currently available in the market. A market study suggest that the
probability of sales is 0.75 (that is you will sell 75% of your inventory)
per month. Within a month where the cake is still good you will earn
$500, if the product is not sold by the end of the month (reaches
expiration date) you will lose $200. You want to know if this product is
profitable or not?
 Probability, P(X) Outcome
Sold 0.75 $500
Not Sold 0.25 -$200

0.75 12 500 + 0.25 12 −200 = $3900

0.75 12 500 + 0.25(12)(−200)

= $325
12

𝑃 𝑥 ∗𝑁∗𝑥+ 𝑃 𝑥 ∗𝑁∗𝑥
𝑁
𝑃 𝑥 ∗ 𝑥 + 𝑃 𝑥 ∗ 𝑥 = ෍𝑥 𝑃 𝑥 = 𝐸 𝑥
Expected Value

𝐸 𝑥 = ෍𝑥 𝑃 𝑥
Textbook Definition:

The expected value of a discrete random variable is denoted by E,

and it represents the mean value of the outcomes.

𝐸 𝑥 = ෍𝑥 𝑃 𝑥
𝐸 𝑥 = 𝑒𝑥𝑝𝑒𝑐𝑡𝑒𝑑 𝑉𝑎𝑙𝑢𝑒
Example
• You and your friend play a game. Your friend has a hat with 10
balls in it: 5 blue balls, 4 yellow balls, 1 red ball. You draw one ball
from the hat. If you draw:
a blue ball, you’ll win $0
a yellow ball, you’ll win $2
a red ball, you’ll win $10
Calculate for the expected value.
BINOMIAL PROBABILITY
DISTRIBUTION
 Binomial probability Distribution
Binomial distribution is a specific type of a discrete probability
distribution.
Binomial probability distribution is the result of the procedure
according to the following criteria:

• The procedure has a fixed number of trials.

• The trials must be independent. (The outcome of any
individual trial doesn’t affect the probabilities in the other
trials.)
• Each trial must have all outcomes classified into two
categories (commonly referred to as success and failure)
• The probability of a success remains the same in all trials
 Example
Which of the following are binomial distribution?
1.Telephone surveying a group of 200 people to ask if they
voted for Lu-Olo.
2.Counting the average number of dogs seen at a veterinarian’s
office daily.
3.You take a survey of 50 traffic lights in a certain city, at 3 p.m.,
recording whether the light was red, green, or yellow at that
time.
4.You are at a fair, playing “pop the balloon” with 6 darts. There
are 20 balloons. 10 of the balloons have a ticket inside that say
“win,” and 10 have a ticket that says “lose.”
Ask yourself: is there a fixed number of trials?
Questions Answer
1 YES
2 NO
3 YES
4 YES

Ask yourself: Are there only 2 possible outcomes?

Questions Answer
1 YES
3 NO
4 YES
Ask yourself: are the outcomes independent of each other? In
other words, does the outcome of one trial (or one toss, or one
question) affect another trial?
Questions Answer
1 YES
4 NO

Ask yourself: Does the probability of success remain the same for
each trial?

Questions Answer
1 YES
Which of the four questions is Binomial Probability Distribution?

QUESTION #1
Notation for probability Distribution

𝑃 𝑆 =𝑝 (𝑝 =denotes probability of success)

𝑃 𝐹 =1−𝑝 =𝑞 (𝑞 =denotes probability of failure)
𝑛 denotes the n fixed number of trials
𝑥 denotes a specific number of successes
in n trials
𝑃(𝑥) denotes the probability of having exactly
x successes in n trials
 Derivation of binomial probability formula
The ministry of health has determined that the probability of men
suffers from color blindness is 0.08. If 10 men are selected at
random:

a. What is the probability that all of them are color blind

b. What is the probability that only two of them are color blind
c. What is the probability that at least two of them are color blind

The first in solving this is question to ask oneself, “is this procedure
met the four criteria of binomial probability distribution?”
Let X = color blind men
a. Probability that all 10 men are color blind
𝑃 𝑋 = 10 = (0.08) (0.08) (0.08) (0.08) (0.08) (0.08) (0.08)
(0.08) (0.08) 0.08 = 0.08 10
𝑝𝑥
b. Probability that only two of the men are color blind
𝑃 𝑋 = 2 = (0.08)(0.08)(0.92)(0.92) (0.92) (0.92) (0.92) (0.92)
(0.92) 0.92 = 0.08 2 0.92 10−2
𝑝 𝑥 𝑞𝑛−𝑥
However, there are more than one way to define two color
blinded men. The two men can be the outcome of taking 2
10!
from 10. Therefore, 10𝐶2 =
10−2 !2!
𝑛!
n𝐶𝑥 =
𝑛−𝑥 !𝑥!
The binomial probability distribution is then
𝑛!
𝑃(𝑋 = 𝑥) = p𝑥 𝑞𝑛−𝑥
𝑛 − 𝑥 ! 𝑥!
c. Probability that at least two men are color blind
𝑃 𝑋 ≥ 2 = 1 − 𝑃 𝑋 ≤ 1 = 1 − 0.81 = 0.19
P(X=x) x P(X=x)
0 0.434388454
0.5
1 0.377729091
0.4 2 0.147807035
3 0.034274095
0.3 4 0.005215623
5 0.000544239
0.2 6 3.94376E-05
7 1.95963E-06
0.1
8 6.39011E-08
0
9 1.2348E-09
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 10 1.07374E-11
Three methods for finding the probabilities corresponding to
the random variable x in a binomial distribution

• Method 1: Using the Binomial Probability Formula

𝑛!
𝑃(𝑋 = 𝑥) = p𝑥 𝑞𝑛−𝑥
𝑛 − 𝑥 ! 𝑥!
• Method 2: Using Technology (e.g excel)
• Method 3: Tables (Table A-1 in Appendix of Elementary
statistics by Mario F. Triola)
Example
1. Medication side effects. The probability of adults who
takes the medicine that have side effects is 5%. 30 men are
taking for study, what is the probability of 2 men has side
effects when taking this new medication?
2. Number of Fraudulent Transactions. Suppose in the
probability that a credit card transaction in certain region is 2%.
If there are 50 transactions per year. Find the probability that
the number of fraudulent occurs more than 2.
3. Identifying Gender Discrimination. After being rejected for
employment, Maria Soares learns that the “Lorosa’e Unip Lda” has hired
only 3 women among the last 24 new employees. She also learns that the
pool of applicants is very large, with an approximately equal number of
qualified men and women. Help her address the charge of gender
discrimination by finding the probability of getting 3 or fewer women
when 24 people are hired, assuming that there is no discrimination based
on gender. Does the resulting probability really support such a charge?
 Mean, Variance, and
Standard Deviation
for the Binomial Distribution
Formula for Mean, variance and Std for
binomial distribution

𝑴𝒆𝒂𝒏
𝜇 = 𝑛𝑝

𝑽𝒂𝒓𝒊𝒂𝒏𝒄𝒆
𝜎 2 = 𝑛𝑝𝑞

𝑺𝒕𝒂𝒏𝒅𝒂𝒓𝒅 𝑫𝒆𝒗𝒊𝒂𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏
𝜎 = 𝑛𝑝𝑞
Example
4. Defective processing chips. A company produces chips for
cell phones. At one of its largest factories, 2% of the chips
produced are defective in some way. A quality checks involves a
randomly selecting and testing 500 chips.
a. What are the mean and standard deviation of the number of
defective processing chips in these samples.
b. In an actual experiment, a quality assurance officer collects
500 chips and find that 14 are defective. Does the officer’s
value of 14 defective chips unusual? Does this suggest that
the 2% probability is wrong?
Variation in Statistics
Example 4 is a good illustration of the importance of variation in
statistics. In a traditional algebra course, we might conclude that 14 is
not 2% of 500 simply because 14 does not equal 10 (which is 2% of
500). However, in statistics we recognize that sample results vary. We
don’t expect to get exactly 2% of the defective chips. We recognize
that as long as the results don’t vary too far away from the claimed
rate of 2%, they are consistent with that claimed rate of 2%.
5. Number of orders returned. Retail stores use the binomial
distribution to model the probability that they receive a certain
number of shopping returns each week. For example, suppose it
is known that 10% of all orders get returned at a certain store
each week.
a. Use excel to developed a table (probability mass function and
cumulative distribution function) and graph representing the x = 0
to x=15. The x represents the number of returns product to the
store. If there are 50 orders.
b. If there are 50 orders that week, find the probability that the
store receives more than 9 returns that week.
c. Find the mean and standard deviation if there are 50 orders
that week.
d. In a real experiment, in a week the store receives 15 returns.
Does this unusually high number of returns?
 Number of orders return per week
0.2

0.18

0.16

0.14

0.12

0.1

0.08

0.06

0.04

0.02

0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15
 Mass dist cummula
X P(X=x) P(X=x)
0 0.00515378 0.005154
1 0.02863208 0.033786
2 0.0779429 0.111729
3 0.13856515 0.250294
4 0.1809045 0.431198
5 0.1849246 0.616123
6 0.15410383 0.770227
7 0.10762807 0.877855
8 0.06427788 0.942133
9 0.03332927 0.975462
10 0.01518333 0.990645
11 0.00613468 0.99678
12 0.0022153 0.998995
13 0.0007195 0.999715
14 0.00021128 0.999926
15 5.6342E-05 0.999983
Poisson’s Probability
Distribution
Poisson Probability distribution
• Another type particular discrete probability distribution.
• The Poisson distribution is often used for describing the behavior of
rare events (with small probabilities)
• Definition
The Poisson distribution is a discrete probability distribution that
applies to occurrences of some event over a specified interval. The
random variable x is the number of occurrences of the event in an
interval. The interval can be time, distance, area, volume, or some
similar unit.
The probability of the event occurring x times over an interval is given
by
𝜇 𝑥 𝑒 −𝜇
𝑃 𝑥 = ; e = 2.71828
𝑥!
Requirements for the Poisson Distribution
• The random variable x is the number of occurrences of an event over
some interval
• The occurrences must be random
• The occurrences must be independent of each other
• The occurrences must be uniformly distributed over the interval being
used.
Parameters of the Poisson Distribution
• The mean is 𝜇
• The standard deviation 𝜎 = 𝜇
Binomial vs Poison
• A Poisson distribution differs from a binomial distribution in these
fundamental ways:

1. The binomial distribution is affected by the sample size n and the

probability p, whereas the Poisson distribution is affected only by the
mean
2. In a binomial distribution, the possible values of the random variable x
are 0, 1, , n, but a Poisson distribution has possible x values of 0, 1, 2….,
with no upper limit.
Examples
1. A student receives, on average, 7 text messages in 2-hour period.
a. What is the probability that the student will receive exactly 9 text
messages in a 2-hour period.
b. What is the probability that the students will receive exactly 24 text
messages in an 8-hour period?
2. A small business receives, on average, 8 calls per hour.
a. What is the probability that the business will receive exactly 7 calls
in 1 hour?
b. What is the probability that the business will receive, at most, 5 calls
in one hour?
c. What is the probability that the business will receive more than 6
calls in one hour?
Example
3. Earthquakes For a recent period of 100 years, there were 93 major
earthquakes (measuring at least 6.0 on the Richter scale) in the world
(based on data from the World Almanac and Book of Facts). Assume
that the Poisson distribution is a suitable model.
a. Find the mean number of major earthquakes per year.
b. If P(x) is the probability of x earthquakes in a randomly selected year,
find P(0), P(1), P (2), P (3), P (4), P (5), P (6), and P (7).
c. The actual results are as follows: 47 years (0 major earthquakes); 31
years (1 major earthquake); 13 years (2 major earthquakes); 5 years
(3 major earthquakes), 2 years (4 major earthquakes); 0 years (5
major earthquakes); 1 year (6 major earthquakes); 1 year (7 major
earthquakes). How do these actual results compare to the
probabilities found in part (b)? Does the Poisson distribution appear
to be a good model in this case?
x P(X=x)
0 0.367879
ACTUAL DATA:
1 0.367879 47 years (0 major earthquakes); 31 years (1 major
2 0.18394 earthquake); 13 years (2 major earthquakes); 5 years (3
3 0.061313 major earthquakes), 2 years (4 major earthquakes); 0
4 0.015328 years (5 major earthquakes); 1 year (6 major
5 0.003066 earthquakes); 1 year (7 major earthquakes).
6 0.000511
7 7.3E-05
Poisson Distribution as an Approximation
to the Binomial Distribution
• The Poisson distribution is sometimes used to approximate
the binomial distribution when n is large, and p is small.
• One rule of thumb is to use such an approximation when the
following two requirements are both satisfied.
Requirements:
𝑛 ≥ 100
𝑛𝑝 ≤ 10
• If both requirements are satisfied and we want to use the
Poisson distribution as an approximation to the binomial
distribution, we need a value for . That value can ben
calculated by using Formula

𝜇 = 𝑛𝑝
Example
5. Winning Bola Merah. In the SDSB game you pay $1 to
select sequence of 4 digits, such as 1432. If you play this game
once every day. Find the probability of winning exactly once in
365 days.
1
𝜇 = 𝑛𝑝 = 365 ∗ = 0.0365
10000
After having find the mean we can use poisons distributions to
calculate for P(x), where is probability of winning.

0.0365 1 2.71828 0.0365

𝑃 1 = = 0.035 ≈ 3.5%
1!
HOMEWORK
1.Number of girls in a family. Let the random variable x represent
the number of girls in a family of four children. Construct a table
describing the probability distribution, then find the mean and
standard deviation. (Hint: List the different possible outcomes.) Is it
unusual for a family of four children to consist of four girls?
2.Expected Value in New Jersey’s Pick 4 Game. In New Jersey’s
Pick 4 lottery game, you pay $0.50 to select a sequence of four
digits, such as 1332. If you select the same sequence of four digits
that are drawn, you win and collect $2788.
a. How many different selections are possible?
b. What is the probability of winning?
c. If you win, what is your net profit?
d. Find the expected value
3. Eye Color. In the United States, 40% of the population have brown
eyes (based on data from Dr. P. Sorita Soni at Indiana University). If 14
people are randomly selected, find the probability that at least 12 of
them have brown eyes. Is it unusual to randomly select 14 people and
find that at least 12 of them have brown eyes? Why or why not?
4. Job Survey. In a survey of 320 college graduates, 36% reported that
they stayed on their first full-time job less than one year (based on data
from USA Today and Experience.com).
a. If 15 of those survey subjects are randomly selected without
replacement for a follow-up survey, find the probability that 5 of them
stayed on their first full-time job less than one year.
b. If part (a) is changed so that 20 different survey subjects are
selected, explain why the binomial probability formula cannot be used.
5. Voting In a past presidential election, the actual voter turnout
(eligible voters who participated in the election) was 61%. In a survey,
1002 subjects were asked if they voted in the presidential election.
a. Find the mean and standard deviation for the numbers of actual
voters in groups of 1002.
b. In the survey of 1002 people, 701 said that they voted in the last
presidential election. Is this result consistent with the actual voter
turnout, or is this result unlikely to occur with an actual voter turnout of
61%? Why or why not?
c. Based on these results; does it appear that accurate voting results
can be obtained by asking voters how they acted?
6. Cell Phones and Brain Cancer. In a study of 420,095 cell phone
users in Denmark, it was found that 135 developed cancer of the
brain or nervous system. If we assume that the use of cell phones has
no effect on developing such cancer, then the probability of a person
having such a cancer is 0.000340.
a. Assuming that cell phones have no effect on developing cancer,
find the mean and standard deviation for the numbers of people in
groups of 420,095 that can be expected to have cancer of the brain
or nervous system.
b. Based on the results from part (a), is it unusual to find that among
420,095 people, there are 135 cases of cancer of the brain or
nervous system? Why or why not?
c. What do these results suggest about the publicized concern that
cell phones are a health danger because they increase the risk of
cancer of the brain or nervous system?