California State University, Long Beach

Dept. of Civil Engineering & Construction Engineering Management

CE 508 Probabilistic and Statistical Methods in Engineering Applications
Instructor: Dr. Joseph Kim, P.E., LEED AP BD+C

Individual Homework Assignment #2

Assigned date: September 7, 2023

Due date: September 14, 2023

An environmental engineer monitored sound level in a building every 15 seconds to determine

whether noise levels were within EPA standards. The values below present the noise levels,
recorded in dBA units, for 45 15-second intervals. Using the data set given to you, answer the
follow questions. Note: Do not use computer program for all three problems in hw#2. I want to see
your work by hand on the green color engineering papers or white printing papers, scan them together,
and then upload one single pdf document to Canvas.

66 56 70 72 67 68 70 71 74 69 72 70 70 70 72
66 70 72 72 65 70 70 72 64 68 71 70 70 78 86
85 70 76 70 74 72 70 70 75 70 70 68 70 69 73

1. Calculate the followings:

(1) Arithmetic mean
(2) Median
(3) Mode
(4) Midrange [Formula = {(Xsmallest+Xlargest)/2}]
(5) Quartiles (Need to compute Q1 and Q3; Read page 111)
(6) Midhinge [Formula = {(Q1+Q3)/2}]
(7) Range [Formula = (Xlargest - Xsmallest)]
(8) Interquartile range
(9) Sample Variance
(10) Sample Standard deviation

2. Compare the mean and median values. Do you think the distribution is skewed? If so, in what
direction? Explain.

3. Construct a box-and-whisker plot for the sound level data above.