National Institute of Technology Agartala

B. Tech 3rd Semester

Lesson Plan / Assignment Problem
N.B.: For the assignment, you have to answer any 6 questions from the Poisson Distribution and
Normal Distribution, any 5 questions from the Correlation, and 4 questions from the Regression.

* * * Bayes Theorem * * *

1. State and proof Bayes theorem.

2. Suppose that a product is produced in three factories X. Y and Z. It is known that factory X produced thrice as
many as items as factory Y and that factories Y and Z produce the same number of items. Assume that it is
known that 3 percent of the items produced by each factories X and Z are defective while 5 percent of those
manufactured by factory Y are defective. All the items produced in the three factories are stocked and an item
of product is selected at random.
(i) What is the probability that this item is defective?
(ii) If an item selected at random is found to be defective, what is the probability that it was produced by
factory X, Y and Z respectively?
3. A factory produces a certain type of outputs by three types of machine. The respective daily production figures
are, Machine-I: 3,000 units; Machine-II: 2,500 units; Machine-III: 4,500 units. Past experience shows that 1%
of the output produced by Machine-I is defective. The corresponding fractions of defective for the other two
machines are 1.2% and 2% respectively. An item is drawn at random from the day’s production run and is found
to be defective. What is the probability that
(i) It comes from the output of Machine-I
(ii) It comes from the output of Machine-II
(iii) It comes from the output of Machine-III?
4. In 2024 there will be three candidates for the position of Assistant Professor – Mr. Chatterji, Mr Ayangar and
Dr. Singh, whose chance of getting the appointment are in proportion [Link] respectively. The probability that
Mr. Chatterji if selected would introduce co-education in the college is 0.3. The probability of Mr Ayangar and
Dr. Singh doing the same are respectively 0.5 and 0.8.
(i) What is the probability that there will be co-education in the college in 2025?
(ii) If there is co-education in the college in 2025, what is the probability that Dr. Singh is the Assistant
Professor in the Institute?
5. The chances that doctor A will diagnose a disease X correctly is 60%. The chances that a patient will die by his
treatment after correct diagnosis is 40% and the chances of death by wrong diagnosis is 70%. A patient of doctor
A, who has disease X, died. What is the probability that his disease was diagnosed correctly?

6. Ram and Sham are two weak students of statistics and their chances of solving a problem in statistics correctly
are 1/6 and 1/8 respectively. If the probability of their making a common error is 1/525 and they obtain the
same result, find the probability that their answer is correct?
7. A vessel containing 3 white and 5 black balls, 4 balls are transferred into an empty vessel. From this vessel a
ball is drawn and is found to be white. What is the probability that out of four balls transferred 3 white and 1 is
black?

8. In answering a question on a multiple choice test a student either knows the answer or he guesses. Let p be the
probability that he knows the answer and 1-p the probability that he guesses. Assume that a student who guesses
a answer will be correct with probability 1/5, where 5 is the number of multiple-choice alternatives. What is the
conditional probability that a student knew the answer to a question given that he answered it correctly?

* * * Classical Probability * * *

1. An urn contains 6 white, 4 red and 9 black balls. If 3 balls are drawn at random, find the probability that:
(i) two of the balls drawn are white,
(ii) one is of each colour,
 (iii) none is red,
(iv) at least one is white
2. Five salesmen of A, B, C, D and E of a company are considered for a three member trade delegation to represent
the company in an international trade conference, construct the sample space and find the probability that:

(i) A is selected,
(ii) A is not selected,
(iii) Either A or B (not both) is selected. (Assume the natural assignment of probability)

3. The probability that a student passes a Physics test is 2/3 and the probability that he passes both a Physics test
and an English test is 14/45. The probability that he passes at least one test is 4/5. What is the probability that
he passes the English test?

4. An investment consultant predicts that the odds against the price of a certain stock will go up during the next
week are 2:1 and the odds in favour of the price remaining the same are 1:3. What is the probability that the
price of the stock will go down during the next week?

5. Three newspapers A, B and C are published in a certain city. It is estimated from a survey that of the adult
population: 20% read A, 16% read B, 14% read C, 8 % read both A and B, 5% read both A and C, 4% read both
B and C, 2% read all three. Find what percentage read at least one of the papers.

6. Three groups of children contain respectively 3 girls and 1 boy, 2 girls and 2 boys, and 1 girl and 3 boys. One
child is selected at random from each group. Show that the chance that the three selected consist of 1 girl and 2
boys is 13/32.

7. Two computers A and B are to be marked. A salesmen who is assigned the job of finding customers for them has
60% and 40% chances respectively of succeeding in case of computer A and B. The two computers can be sold
independently. Given that he was able to sell at least one compute, what is the probability that computer A has
been sold?

* * * Random Variable and Distribution Function * * *

1. X is a discrete random variate having probability mass function:

x 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
P(x) 0 k 2k 2k 3k k2 2k2 2
7k + k

(i) Determine the constant k.

(ii) Find (X < 6).
(iii) What will be (X ≥ 6).

2. Two dice are rolled. Let X denote the random variable which counts the total number of points on the upturned
faces, Construct a table giving the non-zero values of the probability mass function and draw the probability chart.
Also find the distribution function of X?

3. An experiment consists of three independent tosses of fair coin. Let: X= the number of heads, Y = the number of
head runs, Z = the length of head runs, a head run being defined as consecutive occurrence of at least two heads,
its length then being the number of heads occurring together in three tosses of the coin.
(i) Find the probability function of X,
(ii) Find the probability function of Y,
(iii) Find the probability function of Z,
(iv) Find the probability function of X+Y,
(v) Find the probability function of XY.

4. The diameter, say X, of an electric cable, is assumed to be a continuous random variable with p.d.f.:
𝑓( 𝑥) = 6𝑥(1 − 𝑥), 0 ≤ 𝑥 ≤ 1
(i) Check that f(x) is a p.d.f.
 (ii) Obtain an expression for the distribution function of X,
(iii) Compute 𝑃(𝑋 ≤ 1/2|1/3 ≤ 2/3), and
(iv) Compute the number k such that P(X < k) = P(X > k).

5. A continuous random variable X has a p.d.f. 𝑓(𝑥 ) = 3𝑥 , 0 ≤ 𝑥 ≤ 1. Find a and b such that,
(i) P(X ≤ a) = P(X > a),
(ii) P(X > b) = 0.05.

6. Let X be a continuous random variable with p.d.f:

𝑎𝑥 , 0≤𝑥≤1
𝑎 , 1≤𝑥≤2
𝑓(𝑥) =
−𝑎𝑥 + 3𝑎 , 2≤𝑥≤3
0 , 𝑒𝑙𝑠𝑒𝑤ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒
(i) Determine the constant 𝑎?
(ii) Compute P( X ≤ 1.5).

7. Prove that the geometric mean 𝐺 of the distribution: 𝑑𝐹 = 6(2 − 𝑥)( 𝑥 − 1)𝑑𝑥 , 1 ≤ 𝑥 ≤ 2 , is given by
6 𝑙𝑜𝑔(16𝐺) = 19.

8. The Probability distribution of a random variable X is: 𝑓(𝑥) = 𝑘 sin 𝜋𝑥, 0 ≤ 𝑥 ≤ 5. Determine the constant 𝑘
and obtain the median and quartiles of the distribution.

9. A random variable X is distributed at random between the values 0 and 1 so that its probability density function
is: 𝑓(𝑥) = 𝑘𝑥 (1 − 𝑥 ), where k is a constant. Find the value of k. Using this value of k, find its mean and
variance.

10. In a continuous distribution whose relative frequency density is given by: 𝑓(𝑥) = 𝑦 . 𝑥(2 − 𝑥), 0 ≤ 𝑥 ≤ 2,
find the mean, variance, mean deviation about mean, harmonic mean, median, mode of the distribution and
also show that for the distribution 𝜇 = 0.

11. Calculate the standard deviation and mean deviation from mean if the frequency function 𝑓(𝑥) has the form

3 + 2𝑥
𝑓(𝑥) = , 𝑓𝑜𝑟 2 ≤ 𝑥 ≤ 4
18
0 , 𝑜𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑤𝑖𝑠𝑒

12. Find the mean, variance and the coefficients β1, β2 of the distribution: 𝑑𝐹 = 𝑘𝑥2 𝑒 𝑑𝑥 = 1, 0 ≤ 𝑥 ≤ ∞.

13. Suppose that the life in hours of a certain part of radio tube is a continuous random variable X with p.d.f. given
by:

100
𝑓(𝑥) = 𝑥 , 𝑤ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝑥 ≥ 100
0, 𝑒𝑙𝑠𝑒𝑤ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒
(i) What is the probability that all of three such tubes in a given radio set will have to be replaced during the
first 150 hours of operation?
(ii) What is the probability that none of three of the original tubes will have to be replaced during that first
150 hours of operation?
(iii) What is the probability that a tube will last less than 200 hours if it is known that the tube is still
functioning after 150 hours of service?

14. A petrol pump is supplied with petrol once a day. If its daily volume of sales (X) in thousands of liters is
distributed by: 𝑓(𝑥) = 5(1 − 𝑥) , 0 ≤ 𝑥 ≤ 1 , what must be the capacity of its tank in order that the
probability that its supply will be exhausted in a given day shall be 0.01?
15. Verify that the following function is a distribution function of the random variable X:

0 , 𝑥 < −𝑎
1 𝑥
𝑓(𝑥) = +1 , −𝑎 ≤ 𝑥 ≤ 𝑎
2 𝑎
1 , 𝑥>𝑎
16. The amount of bread (in hundreds of pounds) x that a certain bakery is able to sell in a day is found to be a
numerical valued random phenomenon, with a probability function specified by the p.d.f. 𝑓(𝑥), given by:

𝑘𝑥 , 0≤𝑥<5
𝑓(𝑥) = 𝑘(10 − 𝑥) , 5 ≤ 𝑥 < 10
0 , 𝑜𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑤𝑖𝑠𝑒

a) Find the value of k such that f(x) is a p.d.f.

b) What is the probability that the number of pounds of bread that will be sold tomorrow is:
(i) more than 500 pounds,
(ii) less than 500 pounds, and
(iii) between 250 and 750 pound?
c) Denoting by A, B and C the events that the pounds of bread sold are as in b(i), b(ii) and b(iii) respectively,
find P(A|B) and P(A|C). Are
(i) A and B independent events?
(ii) A and C independent events?

* * * Binomial Distribution * * *

1. Ten Coins are thrown simultaneously. Find the probability of getting atleast seven heads.

2. A and B play a game in which their chances of winning are in the ratio 3:2. Find A’s chance of winning at-least
three games out of the five games played.

3. A coffee connoisseur claims that he can distinguish between a cup of instant coffee and a cup of percolator coffee
75% of the time. It is agreed that his claim will be accepted if he correctly identifies at least 5 of the 6 cups. Find
his chance of having the claim (i) accepted, (ii) rejected, when he does have the ability he claims.

4. A multiple choice test consists of 8 questions with 3 answers to each question (of which only one is correct). A
student answers each questions by rolling a die and checking the first answer if he gets 1 or 2, the second answer
if he gets 3 or 4 and the third answer if he gets 5 or 6. To get a distinction, the student must secure at least 75%
correct answer. If there is no negative marking, what is the probability that the student secures a distinction?

5. An irregular six-faced die is thrown and the expectation that in the 10 throws it will give five even numbers is
twice the expectation that it will give four even numbers. How many items in 10,000 sets of 10 throws each,
would you expect it to give not an even numbers?

6. A department in a works has 10 machines which may need adjustment from time to time during the day. Three
of these machines are old; each having a probability of 1/11 of needing adjustment during the day, and 7 are
new, having corresponding probabilities of 1/21. Assuming that no machine needs adjustment twice on the
same day, determine the probabilities that on a particular day,
(i) Just 2 old and no new machines need adjustment.
(ii) If just 2 machines need adjustment, they are of the same type.

7. The probability of a man hitting a target is 1/4

(i) If he fires 7 times, what is the probability of his hitting the target at least twice?
(ii) How many times he fires so that the probability of his hitting at least once is greater than ?
8. In a precision bombing attack there is a 50% chance that any one bomb will strike the target. Two direct hits are
required to destroy the target completely. How many bombs must be dropped to give a 99% chance or better of
completely destroying the target?

9. In a binomial distribution consisting of 5 independent trials, probabilities of 1 and 2 successes are 0.4096
and 0.2048 respectively. Find the parameter ‘𝑝’ of the distribution.

10. With the usual notations, find ‘𝑝’ for the binomial variate X, if 𝑛 = 6 and 9𝑃(𝑋 = 4) = 𝑃(𝑋 = 2).

11. The mean and variance of binomial distribution are 4 and 4/5 respectively. Find 𝑃(𝑋 ≥ 1).

* * * Poisson Distribution and Normal Distribution * * *

1. Establish the Poisson distribution result from the Binomial distribution.

2. A manufacturer of cotter pins knows that 5% of his product is defective. If he sells cotter pins in boxes of 100
and guarantees that not more than 10 pins will be defective, what is the approximate probability that a box will
fail to meet the guaranteed quality?

3. An insurance company insures 4,000 people against loss of both eyes in a car accident. Based on the previous
data, the rates were computed on the assumption that on the average 10 persons in 1,00,000 will have car accident
each year that results in this type of injury. What is the probability that more than 3 of the insured will collect
on their policy in a given year?

4. In a book of 520 pages, 390 typo-graphical errors occur. Assuming Poisson law for the number of errors per
page, find the probability that a random sample of 5 pages will contain no error.

5. X is normally distributed and the mean X is 12 standard deviation is 4.

a) Find out the probability of the following

(i) X ≥ 20, (ii) X ≤ 20 and (iii) 0 ≤ X ≤ 12
b) Find 𝑥 , when P(X > 𝑥 , ) = 0.24
c) Find 𝑥 , and 𝑥 , when 𝑃(𝑥 , < 𝑋 < 𝑥 , ) = 0.50 and 𝑃(𝑋 > 𝑥 , ) = 0.25

6. X is a normal variate with mean 30 and standard deviation 5. Find the probabilities of the following:

(i) 26 ≤ 𝑋 ≤ 40, (ii) 𝑋 ≥ 45 and (iii) |X – 30| > 5

7. The mean yield for one-acre plot is 662 kilos with a s.d. 32 kilos. Assuming normal distribution, how many one
acre plots in a batch of 1,000 plots would you expect to have yield.

(i) Over 700 kilos

(ii) Below 650 kilos
(iii) What is the lowest yield of the best 100 plots?

8. There are six hundred Economics students in the post-graduate classes of a university, and the probability for
any student to need a copy of a particular book from the university library on any day is 0.05. How many copies
of the book should be kept in the university library so that the probability may be greater than 0.90 that none of
the students needing a copy from the library has to come back disappointed?

9. The Local authorities in a certain city install 10,000 electric lamps in the street of the city. If these lamps have
an average life of 1,000 burning hours with a standard deviation of 200 hours, assuming normality, what number
of lamps might be expected to fail
 (i) In the first 800 burning hours.
(ii) Between 800 and 1,200 burning hours?
After what period of burning hours would you expect that
(i) 10% of the lamp would fail?
(ii) 10% of the lamps would be still burning?

10. The marks obtained by a number of students for a certain subject are assumed to be approximately normally
distributed with mean value 65 and with a standard deviation of 5. If 3 students are taken at random from this
set, what is the probability that exactly 2 of them will have marks over 70?

11. In an examination it is laid down that a student passes if he secures 30% or more marks. He is placed in the first,
second or third division according as he secures 60% or more marks, between 45% and 60% marks and marks
between 30% and 45% respectively. He gets distinction in case he secures 80% or more marks. It is noticed from
the results that 10% of the students failed in the examination; where as 5% of them obtained distinction.
Calculate the percentage of students placed in the second division. (assume normal distribution of marks).

* * * Correlation * * *

1. Calculate the correlation coefficient for the following heights (in inches) of father (X) and their sons (Y)
X: 65 66 67 67 68 69 70 72
Y: 67 68 65 68 72 72 69 71

2. A computer while calculating correlation coefficient between two variables X and Y from 25 pairs of
observations obtained the results: 𝑛 = 25 , ∑ 𝑋 = 125 , ∑ 𝑋 = 650 , ∑ 𝑌 = 100 , ∑ 𝑌 = 460 , ∑ 𝑋𝑌 = 508 .
Later discovered at the time of checking that the two pairs

X Y Are incorrect while the correct values are X Y .

6 14 8 12
9 6 6 8
Obtain the correct value of correlation coefficient.

3. The variables X and Y are connected by the equation 𝑎𝑋 + 𝑏𝑌 + 𝑐 = 0. Show that the correlation between
them is –1 if the sign of a and b are alike and +1 if they are different.

4. X and Y are two random variables with variances 𝜎 and 𝜎 respectively and r is the coefficient of correlation
between them. If 𝑈 = 𝑋 + 𝑘𝑌 and 𝑉 = 𝑋 + (𝜎 /𝜎 )𝑌, find the value of 𝑘 so that 𝑈 and 𝑉 are uncorrelated.

5. The random variable X and Y are jointly normally distributed and U and V are defined by 𝑈 = 𝑋𝑐𝑜𝑠𝛼 + 𝑌𝑠𝑖𝑛𝛼,
𝑉 = 𝑌𝑐𝑜𝑠𝛼 – 𝑋𝑠𝑖𝑛𝛼. Show that 𝑈 and 𝑉 will be uncorrelated if
2𝑟𝜎 𝜎
tan 2𝛼 =
𝜎 −𝜎
Where 𝑟 = 𝑐𝑜𝑟𝑟. (𝑋, 𝑌); 𝜎 = 𝑉𝑎𝑟(𝑋) 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝜎 = 𝑉𝑎𝑟(𝑌). Are 𝑈 and 𝑉 independent?

6. If X and Y are standardized random variables and

1 + 2𝑎𝑏
𝑟(𝑎𝑋 + 𝑏𝑌, 𝑏𝑋 + 𝑎𝑌) =
𝑎 −𝑏
find 𝑟(𝑋 , 𝑌), the coefficient of correlation between X and Y.

7. If X and Y are uncorrelated random variables with means zero and variances 𝜎 and 𝜎 respectively. Show that
𝑈 = 𝑋𝑐𝑜𝑠𝛼 + 𝑌𝑠𝑖𝑛𝛼, 𝑉 = 𝑋𝑠𝑖𝑛𝛼 – 𝑌𝑐𝑜𝑠𝛼 have a correlation coefficient 𝜌 given by
𝜎 −𝜎
𝜌=
[(𝜎 − 𝜎 ) + 4𝜎 𝜎 𝑐𝑜𝑠𝑒𝑐 2𝛼] /
8. The marks obtained by 10 students in Mathematics (X) and Statistics (Y) are given below. Find the coefficient of
correlation between X and Y.

Roll No. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
X 75 30 60 80 53 35 15 40 38 48
Y 85 45 54 91 58 63 35 43 45 44

9. Using the formula 𝜎 = 𝜎 + 𝜎 − 2𝑟(𝑋, 𝑌)𝜎 𝜎 obtain the correlation coefficient between the heights of
father (X) and of the sons (Y) from the following data.

X: 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 67
Y: 67 68 64 72 70 67 70 68

10. In two sets of variables X and Y with 50 observations each. The data were observed as 𝑋 = 10; 𝜎 = 3; 𝑌 =
6; 𝜎 = 3; = 2 and 𝑟(𝑋 , 𝑌) = 0.3. But on the subsequent verification it was found that one value of 𝑋(= 10)
and the corresponding value of 𝑌(= 6) were inaccurate and hence weeded out. With the remaining pairs of values,
how the original value of 𝑟 affected?

11. X, Y and Z are random variables each with expectation 10 and variance 1, 4 and 9 respectively. The correlation
coefficients are 𝑟(𝑋 , 𝑌) = 0, 𝑟(𝑌 , 𝑍) = 𝑟(𝑋 , 𝑍) = 1/4. Obtain the numerical values of:
(i) 𝐸(𝑋 + 𝑌 − 2𝑍),
(ii) 𝐶𝑜𝑣(𝑋 + 3, 𝑌 + 3)
(iii) 𝑉(𝑋 − 2𝑍) and
(iv) 𝐶𝑜𝑣(2𝑋 + 3,2𝑌 − 3)

12. Two random variables X and Y have zero means, the same variance 𝜎 and zero correlation. Show that 𝑈 =
𝑋𝑐𝑜𝑠𝛼 + 𝑌𝑠𝑖𝑛𝛼 and 𝑉 = 𝑋𝑠𝑖𝑛𝛼 – 𝑌𝑐𝑜𝑠𝛼, have the same variance 𝜎 and zero correlation.

* * * Regression * * *

1. Obtain the equation of two lines of regression for the following data. Also obtain the estimate of 𝑋 for 𝑌 = 70.
X: 65 66 67 67 68 69 70 72
Y: 67 68 65 68 72 72 69 71

2. In a partially destroyed laboratory, records of an analysis of correlation data, the following results only are
legible: Variance of 𝑋 = 9; Regression equations: 8𝑋 − 10𝑌 + 66 = 0 and 40𝑋 − 18𝑌 = 244. What are
(i) the mean values of X and Y.
(ii) the correlation coefficient between X and Y.
(iii) the standard deviation of Y.
3. Find the most likely price in Mumbai corresponding to the price of Rs. 70 at Kolkata from the following:
Kolkata Mumbai
Average Price 65 67
Standard Deviation 2.5 3.5
Correlation coefficient between the prices of commodities in the two cities is 0.8

4. The following information about advertising expenditure and sales with correlation coefficient = 0.8:
Advertising Expenditure (X) Sales (Y)
(Rs. Lakhs) (Rs. Lakhs)
Mean 10 90
Standard Deviation 3 12
What should be the advertising budget if the company wants to attain sales target of Rs. 120 Lakhs.