Sample Space Practice Questions
Section 1: Identify Sample Spaces
1. Toss a fair coin once.
2. Roll a six-sided die once.
3. Toss a coin twice.
4. Roll two six-sided dice and record the sum.
5. Pick one number at random from the set of natural numbers less than 5.
Section 2: Use Set-Builder Notation
6. Express the sample space for all even positive integers using set-builder notation.
7. Express the sample space for all real numbers between 0 and 1 using set-builder
notation.
8. Express the sample space for all integers that are multiples of 3 using set-builder
notation.
9. Express the sample space for all natural numbers less than 100 using set-builder
notation.
10. Express the sample space for all students with GPA greater than 3.5 using set-
builder notation.
Section 3: Coarse vs. Fine-Grained Sample Spaces
11. Identify which sample space is finer and explain why:
S₁ = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6}, S₂ = {even, odd}
12. Identify which sample space is finer and explain why:
S₁ = {win, lose, draw}, S₂ = {win by >10, win by ≤10, lose by >10, lose by ≤10,
draw}
Section 4: Conceptual Understanding
13. Why should a good sample space contain mutually exclusive and collectively
exhaustive outcomes?
14. Is it valid to define a sample space as S = {tall, short, medium}? Justify whether it
is atomic and distinguishable.
15. In a medical study on recovery time: Would {fast, moderate, slow} be a good
sample space? How might you represent it using a finer sample space?
Section 5: Real-Life Sample Space Modeling
16. Define an appropriate sample space for drawing a single playing card from a
standard deck.
17. Define an appropriate sample space for measuring the time (in seconds) a
webpage takes to load.
18. Define an appropriate sample space for recording the blood type of 100 patients.
19. Define an appropriate sample space for surveying people on their preferred
streaming platform (Netflix, Prime, etc.).
20. Define an appropriate sample space for testing light bulbs until one fails.
Section 6: Additional Conceptual and Real-Life Scenarios
21. Describe the event A that the number of points rolled with the die is divisible by
3.
22. Describe the event B that the total number of points rolled with the pair of dice
is 7.
23. If someone takes three shots at a target and we care only whether each shot is a
hit or a miss, describe a suitable sample space.
24. What are the elements of the sample space that constitute event M that the
person will miss the target three times in a row?
25. What are the elements of event N that the person will hit the target once and
miss it twice?
26. Construct a sample space for the length of the useful life of a certain electronic
component and indicate the subset that represents the event F that the component
fails before the end of the sixth year.