UECM1693/UECM2623/UCCM2623 Tutorial S4: Applications of Statistics

1. The time taken to complete a statistics test by all students is normally distributed with a mean
of 120 minutes and a standard deviation of 10 minutes. For a random sample of 16 students,
find the probability that the mean time taken to complete this test is
(a) between 122 and 126 minutes.
(b) within 4 minutes of the population mean.
(c) lower than the population mean by 2 minutes or more.
Answer: (a) 0.2037 (b) 0.8904 (c) 0.2119
2. The time that university students spend studying per week has a distribution that is skewed to
the right with a mean of 8.4 hours and a standard deviation of 2.7 hours. For a random sample
of 45 students, find the probability that the mean time spent studying per week is
(a) between 8 and 9 hours.
(b) less than 8 hours.
Answer: (a) 0.7708 (b) 0.1611
3. A company opened a new movie theater. Before setting the price of a movie ticket, the company
wants to find the average price charged by other movie theaters. A random sample of 100 movie
theaters taken by the company showed that the mean price of a movie ticket is RM6.75 with a
standard deviation of RM0.80.
(a) What is the point estimate of the mean price of a movie tickets for all theaters? What is
the margin of error associated with 95% confidence interval?
(b) Make a 95% confidence interval for the population mean, .
Answer: (a) RM 6.75, 0.1568 (b) (RM 6.59, RM 6.91)
4. A random sample of 15 students showed that the mean time taken to solve a computer assignment
is 21 minutes with a standard deviation of 3 minutes. Assume that the time taken to solve this
assignment by all students follows an approximately normal distribution.
(a) Build a 98% confidence interval for the mean time taken to solve this computer assignment.
(b) Construct a 95% confidence interval for the mean time taken to solve this computer assignment.
(c) Is the width of the confidence interval built is (a) larger than that of (b)? Why?
Answer: (a) (18.9675, 23.0325) (b) (19.3385, 22.6615)
5. According to a study, the average household income of 25 online shoppers in KL is RM5900.
Assume that household income of all online shoppers in KL follows a normal distribution with
a standard deviation of RM700.
(a) Make a 98% confidence interval for the corresponding population mean.
(b) What is the effect on the width of the confidence interval made if the sample size is increased?
(c) How large should the sample size be so that the 99% confidence interval for the population
mean has a maximum error of 25? .
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Answer: (a) (5574.318, 6225.682) (c) 5202

6. From a past record, women talked an average of 394 minutes per month on their mobile phone
in 2002. Suppose that a recent sample of 295 women who own mobile phone showed that the
mean time they spend per month talking on their mobile phone is 402 minutes with a standard
deviation of 81 minutes.
(a) At the 2% level of significance, can you conclude that the mean time spent talking on their
mobile phone by all women who own mobile phone is currently more than 394 minutes per
month?
(b) What is the Type I error in this case? Explain. What is the probability of making this
error in part (a)?
(c) What is the Type II error in this case? Explain. What is the probability of making this
error in part (a) if the mean is changed to 410 minutes per month?
Answer: (a) 1.70, 2.0537 (b) 0.02 (c) 0.0901
7. The scores of the students in the algebra course have a normal distribution with a mean of 75
and a standard deviation of 8.25. A new teaching system is introduced to a random sample of
25 students, and in the first year under the new system the average score is 78.2.
(a) What is the probability that an average that is higher than this would occur for a random
sample of 25 students in a given year under the old system?
(b) State a null hypothesis and alternative hypothesis for testing the new teaching system.
(c) What is the test statistic and the p-value of the test?
(d) Would the null hypothesis be rejected at significance level of 0.01?
Answer: (a) 0.0262 (c) 1.94, 0.0262
8. According to a basketball coach, the mean height of all female college basketball players is 69.5
inches. A random sample of 25 such players produced a mean height of 70.25 inches with a
standard deviation of 2.1 inches. Assuming that the heights of all female college basketball
players are normally distributed test at the 1% significance level whether their mean height is
different from 69.5 inches.
Answer: 1.786, 2.797