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MTH514 Exam 1 Review Questions

1. A shipment of two boxes, each containing six telephones, is received by a store. Box 1
contains one defective phone, and box 2 contains two defective phones. After the boxes are
unpacked, a phone is selected and found to be defective. Find the probability that it came
from box 2.

Solution
STEP 1 Select the proper notation. Let A1 represent box 1 and A2 represent box 2. Let D
represent a defective phone and ND represent a phone that is not defective.
STEP 2 Draw a tree diagram and find the corresponding probabilities for each branch. The
probability of selecting box 1 is 1/2, and the probability of selecting box 2 is 1/2 . Since there
is one defective phone in box 1, the probability of selecting it is 1/6 . The probability of
selecting a nondefective phone from box 1 is 5/6 . Since there are two defective phones in box
2, the probability of selecting a defective phone from box 2 is 2/6 , or 1/3 ; and the probability
of selecting a nondefective phone is 4/6, or 2/3. The tree diagram is
shown in Figure B2.
STEP 3 Write the corresponding formula. Since the example is asking for the probability that,
given a defective phone, it came from box 2, the corresponding formula is as shown.




2- On a game show, a contestant can select one of four boxes. Box 1 contains one $100 bill
and nine $1 bills. Box 2
contains two $100 bills and eight $1 bills. Box 3 contains three $100 bills and seven $1 bills.
Box 4 contains five
$100 bills and five $1 bills. The contestant selects a box at random and selects a bill from the
box at random. If a $100
bill is selected, find the probability that it came from box 4.
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Solution
STEP 1 Select the proper notation. Let B1, B2, B3, and B4 represent the boxes and 100 and 1
represent the values of the bills in the boxes.
STEP 2 Draw a tree diagram and find the corresponding probabilities. The probability of
selecting each box is , or 0.25. The probabilities of selecting the $100 bill from each box,
respectively, are
Using Bayes theorem, write the corresponding formula. Since the example asks for the
probability that box 4 was selected, given that $100 was obtained, the corresponding formula
is as follows:







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3.
Baseball World Series
The baseball World Series is played by the winner of the National League and the American League. The
first team to win four games wins the World Series. In other words, the series will consist of four to seven
games, depending on the individual victories. The data shown consist of 40 World Series events. The
number of games played in each series is represented by the variable X. Find the probability P(X) for
each X, construct a probability distribution, and draw a graph for the data.


4.

4
5.


6.


5
7.

8.

6
9.

10.






7
11.

12.


13.

8

14.







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15. Tony is tossing balls randomly into 50 boxes, and his goal is to stop when he gets the first
ball into the eighth box. Given that he has tossed 20 balls without getting a ball into the eighth
box, what is the expected number of additional tosses he needs to get a ball into the eighth
box?
Solution With respect to the eighth box, each toss is a Bernoulli trial with probability of
success p =1/50. Let X be the random variable that denotes the number of tosses required to
get a ball into the eighth box. Then X has a geometric distribution. Let K denote the number of
additional tosses required to get a ball into the eighth box, given that no ball is in the box after
20 tosses. Then, because of the forgetfulness property of the geometric distribution, K has the
same distribution
as X. Thus
E[K] =1/p=50

16. One hundred balls are tossed into 50 boxes. What is the expected number of balls in the
tenth box?
Solution If we think of the balls tossed as Bernoulli trials in which a success is defined as
getting a ball in the tenth box, then p =1/50. Let X denote the number of balls that go into the
tenth box. Then X is a binomial random variable with parameters (100, 1/50). Thus,
E[X] =np =100(1/50)=2

17. Find the expected value, variance of the discrete random variable X with the following
PMF:



. Thus, the second moment and variance of X are given by


18.
Messages arrive at a switchboard in a Poisson manner at an average rate of six per hour. Find
the probability for each of the following events:
(a) Exactly two messages arrive within one hour.
(b) No message arrives within one hour.
(c) At least three messages arrive within one hour.
Solution: Let K be the random variable that denotes the number of messages arriving at the
switchboard within a one-hour interval. The PMF of K is given by

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a. The probability that exactly two messages arrive within one hour is

b. The probability that no message arrives within one hour is

c. The probability that at least three messages arrive within one hour is

19.

20. You are performing a cohort study. If the probability of developing disease in the
exposed group is .05 for the study duration, then if you sample (randomly) 500 exposed
people, how many do you expect to develop the disease? Give a margin of error (+/- 1
standard deviation) for your estimate.
X ~binomial (500, .05)
E(X) =500 (.05) =25
Var(X) =500 (.05) (.95) =23.75
StdDev(X) =square root (23.75) =4.87
25 4.87
21. Suppose that a rare disease has an incidence of 1 in 1000 person-years. Assuming that
members of the population are affected independently, find the probability of k cases in a
population of 10,000 (followed over 1 year) for k=0,1,2.

The expected value (mean) = =.001*10,000 =10. 10 new cases expected in this population
per year.
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0 (10)
1 (10)
2 (10)
(10) e
P(X 0) .0000454
0!
(10) e
P(X 1) .000454
1!
(10) e
P(X 2) .00227
2!

= = =
= = =
= = =

Test questions
Use the following data for question 22-26 inclusive:
-12, 1, 0, 5, 6, -5, -2, 0, -3
22. Find the mean
a. 0
b. -.6667
c. -.4444
d. -1.1111
e. None of the above
23. Find the Variance
a. 29.1111
b. 30.5
c. 30
d. 30.2778
e. None of the above
24. Find the Standard Deviation
a. 5.3954
b. 5.5226
c. 5.4772
d. 5.5025
e. None of the above
25. Find the median
a. 0
b. 1
c. -2
d. -3
e. None of the above
26. Find the Mode
a. There is no mode
b. They are all modes
c. 5
d. None of the above