MATH1905: Probability examples

1 Example 1
The students at an elementary school have various characteristics that are of interest to the
school administration. Consider the following events:

- A1 = a student eats school lunch

- A2 = a student brings a lunch box

- A3 = a student rides the bus

- A4 = a student walks to school

Express the following events using union, intersection, and/or compliment notations.

1. A student does not bring a lunch box

2. A student rides the bus or eats school lunch or does both

3. A student brings a lunch box but does not walk to school

4. A student does not either eat school lunch or ride the bus

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2 Example 2
In a large city, two newspapers are published, the Sun and the Post. The circulation de-
partments report that 22% of the city’s households have a subscription to the Sun and 35%
subscribe to the Post. A survey reveals that 6% of all households subscribe to both newspa-
pers. What proportion of the city’s households subscribe to either newspaper?

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3 Example 3
1. In a four-cylinder engine there are four spark plugs. If any one of them malfunctions,
the power of the car will be lost. Suppose for a certain brand of spark plugs, the
probability that a spark plug will function properly after 5000 miles is 0.9. Assuming
that the spark plugs operate independently, what is the probability that the car will
lost power after 5000 miles?

2. A graduate statistics course has seven male and three female students. The professor
wants to select two different students at random to help her conduct a research project.

(a) What is the probability that the two students chosen are female?
(b) What is the probability that at least one of two students chosen is female?

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4 Example 4
A story sells two brands of a particular product, one premium (P) and the other regular (R).
A survey of 1000 salves give the following results::

P R Totals
Male 132 147 279
Female 516 205 721
Totals 648 352 1000

1. What is the probability that a customer purchases the product P?

2. What is the probability that a customer is male?

3. If a customer is female, what is the probability that she will buy product R?

4. Are the events “being male” and ”purchasing P” mutually exclusive ?

5. Are the events “being female” and ”purchasing P” independent?

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5 Example 5
Bad gums may mean a bad heart. Researchers discovered that 85% of people who have
suffered a heart attack had periodontal disease. Only 29% of healthy people have this disease.
Suppose that in a certain community heart attacks occur with 10% probability. If someone
had periodontal disease, what is the probability that he or she will have a heart attack?

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6 Example 6
There are three buckets that weigh 1kg, 2kg and 3kg, respectively. A bucket weighing i kg
contains i white balls and 5 − i black balls, for i = 1, 2, 3. For example, the bucket weighing
1kg contains 1 white ball and 4 black balls. Suppose a bucket is chosen with probability
proportional to its weight and two balls are randomly selected (without replacement) from
this bucket.

1. Find the probability that both balls selected are white.

2. If both balls selected are white, what is the probability that the bucket weighing 3kg
was chosen ?