MFGE 341

Quality Science Statistics

What do we remember?

Normal Distributions

So What is a Normal
Distribution
A continuous probability distribution
for a random variable x
Its graph is called the normal curve

Normal Curves

Continuous Probability Distributions

Because a normal distribution is
continuous, we cannot use a
histogram to graph the data.
We can use a different type of graph
called a probability density function
(or pdf for short)
The total area under a pdf curve is equal
to 1
The pdf curve can never be negative

The Normal Curve

The

normal curve is a specific pdf

curve with the equation

Properties of a Normal
Distribution
The mean, median, and mode are all equal
The normal curve is bell-shaped and
symmetric about the mean
The total area under the normal curve equals 1
The normal curve approaches but never reaches
the x-axis
Within 1 standard deviation of the mean, the
normal curve curves downward, outside of 1
standard deviation it curves upward
This means there is an inflection point at 1 standard
deviation

Lets Standardize
If
we standardize our data so the we
have a mean of zero and a standard
deviation of 1, we get the graph of a
standard normal distribution.
We did this before using the z-score
z

Properties of Standard Normal

Distributions

The cumulative area is close to 0 for z-scores close to

z=-3.49
The cumulative area is 0.5 for z=0
The cumulative area is close to 1 for z-scores close to z3.49
As the z-scores increase, the cumulative area increases

What if we want to find the area

somewhere in-between?

Guidelines
Draw the picture
Plot the z-score that you are
interested in
Shade the area
If shaded left, use the value in the table
If shaded right, use 1-the value in the
table
If shaded between two values, subtract
the left value from the right value

What about Probability?

The probability of a normally
distributed event occurring is equal
to the appropriate area under the
normal curve.

Lets do the 2-step

First convert the upper and/or lower
bounds to z-scores
Second, find the area under the
normal distribution utilizing those zscores

Lets do the 2-step

You can also go through the process
backwards.
If you are given an area or probability,
you can find the corresponding z-score
from the table.
Once you have the z-score, you can
determine the desired value from the
mean and standard deviation.

Central Limit Theorem

The central limit theorem describes
the relationship between the
sampling distribution of sample
means and the population mean

Sampling Distribution

Central Limit Theorem

If the population is normally
distributed than the sampling
distribution of sample means is
normally distributed
If we do not know how the population
is distributed, but our sample size is
at least 30, then the sampling
distribution of sample means is
approximately normal

Central Limit Theorem

The mean of the sample means is
equal to the population mean
The standard deviation of the sample
means is equal to the standard
deviation of the population divided
by the square root of the sample size

Mean Probability
To
find the probability that a sample
mean will lie in a given interval of the
sample distribution, convert it to the
z-score

Approximating a Binomial
Distribution
What happens when we need to
calculate a binomial distribution on a
large number of events?
Too much work to use the binomial
distribution formulas
Try to approximate the binomial
distribution as a normal distribution

Can we do that?
If
and , and x is a random variable,
than we can do a normal
approximation
Our mean would be
Our standard deviation would be

Maybe not
Because you are using a continuous
distribution to approximate a discrete
distribution, there is some error.
We need a continuity correction
factor
Move .5 units to the left and right
Which direction depends on the case

Now we can find the probability

5 Easy Steps
After we recognize that we have a
binomial distribution, to find the
probability, we:
Determine if we can use a normal
approximation
Find the mean and standard deviation
Apply the appropriate continuity
correction
Translate to z-scores
Look up the probability in the table