BA106 Quantitative Method - Tutorial 6

Chapter 6 - Confidence Interval Estimation

1. A paper manufacturer has a production process that operates continuously throughout an
entire production shift. From the past data, the mean length of the paper is 11 inches and the
standard deviation is 0.02 inches. At periodic intervals, a sample is selected to determine if
the mean paper length is still equal to 11 inches or if something has gone wrong in the
production process. The process supervisor selects a random sample of 100 sheets and
found that the mean is 10.998 inches. Construct a 95% confidence interval estimates for the
population mean paper length.
2. If you want to be 95% confidence of estimating the population means to within a sampling
error of +/- 5 and the standard deviation is 20. What is the required sample size?
3. Construct a 95% confidence interval estimate for a normally distributed population mean for
each of the following samples:
Sample a: 1,1,1,2,7,8,8,8
Sample b : 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8
Explain why these two samples produce different confidence intervals even though they
have the same mean and range?
4. A small stationary store has about 2500 pens in the store and wants to estimate the mean
retail value of pens that it has in its inventory. A random sample of 100 pens is selected and
the computed mean of the sample is $2.64 and a standard deviation of $0.44. Assuming a
normal distribution, construct a 95% confidence interval estimate of the mean value of all the
pens in the store.