QM Tutorial practice set 3

Part I
(This part is worth 18 marks. All questions carry equal weight in this part. Please answer by circling one
correct answer. Please do not try to insure yourself or reduce risk by marking more than one correct answer)
1. Which of the following statements is false?
i) The mean of a random variable will always be positive while its standard deviation can never be negative
ii) The standard deviation of a random variable can never be zero
iii) The mean of a random variable can be smaller than its standard deviation
a. i) only

b. i) and iii) only

c. None of them

d.

All of them

Ans: a
2. Chebyshevs rule tells me that approximately at most 16 % of data values are outside of z standard
deviations of the sample mean. If so, the value of z is
a. 1.091

b. 2.35

c. 2.5

d. none of the above

Ans: c
3. In a Confidence Interval determination with sample size 8, if the critical value is 2.998, we state
a)
b)
c)
d)

With 98% confidence that the margin of error is 2.266 if the population standard deviation is 2
With 99% confidence that the margin of error is 1.5899 if the sample standard deviation is 1.5
With 99 % confidence that the margin of error is 0.795 if the population standard deviation is 0.75
With 98% confidence that the margin of error is 1.06 if the sample standard deviation is 1

Ans: d)
4. The Expected Value computed using the formula xf(x) is a numerical measure of the mean of
a. The probability distribution of a population
b. The random variable for a population

b. The random variable for a sample

c. The probability distribution of a sample

Ans: c
5. Which of the following statements are false?
i) A normal distribution can have a probability mass function
ii) In some cases, such as for sampling distributions, the standard normal distribution may have a standard
deviation other than 1 since we need to divide by n
iii) The z-score for a positive value in a sampling distribution always increases when sample sizes are
increased

a) i) and ii) only

b) i) only

c) All of the above

d) i) and iii) only

Ans: a)

6. A statistical test for the equality of a mean, such as H0 : = 10, if = 0.05,

(a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)

95% of the time we will make an incorrect inference

5% of the time we will say that there is a real difference when there is no difference
5% of the time we will say that there is no real difference when there is a difference
95% of the time the null hypothesis will be correct
5% of the time we will make a correct inference

The answer is (b).

7. A group of nutritionists is hoping to prove that a new soybean compound has more
protein per gram than roast beef, which has a mean protein content of 20. A random
sample of 5 batches of the soya compound have been tested, with the following
results:
Protein content 15, 22, 17, 19, 23. What assumption(s) do we have to make in order to carry out
a legitimate statistical test of the nutritionists claim?
(a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)

The observations are from a normally distributed population.

The mean protein content of the 5 batches follows a normal distribution.
The variance of the population is known.
Both (a) and (b) must be assumed.
Both (a), (b), and (c) must be assumed.

The answer is (a).

8. We want to test H0 : = 1.5 vs. H1 : < 1.5 at = .05. A 95% confidence interval for
calculated from a given random sample with standard deviation known is (1.4,
3.6). Based on this finding we:
(a) Fail to reject H0
(b) Reject H0
(c) Cannot make any decision at all because the value of the test statistic is not available.
(d) Cannot make any decision at all because the distribution of the population is unknown.
(e) Cannot make any decision at all because (1.4, 3.6) is only a 95% confidence interval for .
The answer is (b).

9. Consider a binomial parameter p and the test of H0 : p = 0.7. If X represents the

number of successes in 15 trials and if the null hypothesis is rejected if X 13 , what
is the probability of type I error for this test ?
(a) 0.004

(b) 0.035

(c) 0.050

(d) 0.127

(e) 0.965

The answer is (d)

Part II
(This section is worth 12 marks. Each question carries equal marks.)
1. The variance and mean of a uniform distribution are 4/3 and 4 respectively. Please compute the range of
values over which the random variable X is defined.
b) Ans: The distribution is defined over the Range a = 2 to b = 6 or [2,6].

1. In a symmetrical bell-shaped distribution for a continuous random variable X, the empirical rule tells us
that approximately 81.5% of the values lie between a and b, with the mean situated at 10 and the variance
being equal to 16. Compute a and b. (There will be two sets of possible values). Also, compute P(X < a)
and P(X > b) for one set.

Ans.: The empirical rule allows us to infer that 81.5% = 47.5% (2 standard deviations) + 34% of values
(one standard deviation) lie between a and b. No other values are provided by the empirical rule. (If the
students have used the Normal Distribution tables to get the answers, please award NO marks). If the mean
is 10 and the standard deviation is 4, then the two sets of possible values are:
[10 8, 10+ 4] or [2, 14]
[10 4, 10 + 8] or [6, 18]
PART III
(This section is worth 20 marks. Please be very careful with your mathematical notation.)
1. A large hospital wholesaler, as part of an assessment of workplace safety, gave a random sample of 40 of
its warehouse employees a test (measured on a 0 to 100 point scale) on safety procedures. For that sample
of employees, the mean test score was 72 points, with a standard deviation of 6 points. Determine and
interpret a 95% confidence interval for the mean test score of all the companys warehouse employees.
Ans: 95% C.I = 72 + 1.96*6/sqrt (40) = [70.14, 73.86].
Interpretation: The above means that there is 95% chance (or probability or confidence) that the
Population Mean will lie between 70.14 and 73.86 (or in that interval).

2. In the past decade there have been extensive antismoking campaigns to try and reduce the

proportion of smokers in the population. In 1982, a survey of 350 adult females revealed that 148
smoked. In 1989, 488 adult females were surveyed and 163 smoked. Let p represent the
proportion of adult female smokers.
i.

The null and alternate hypotheses are:

Ans.
H0: p1989 = 0.422857
Ha: p1989 < 0.422857

ii.

The test statistic would be computed as:

Ans: Compute (p_bar 0.422857)/Standard Error

iii.

The p-value is found to be:

Ans: Very Small Value

iv.

Suppose the p-value was found to be .053. This means:

Ans. There is some, but not overwhelming evidence, that the proportion of smokers has
decreased.