Statistics Practice set

Theories
● Role of statistics in business decision making.
● Data sources and their relative advantages and disadvantages.
● Statistical averages and their uses.
● Compare and contrast between mean, median and mode.
● Objectives of measures of dispersion.
● Standard deviation as a measure of variation.
● Symmetry of data and measures of skewness.
● Graphical representation of correlation.
● Coefficient of determination and its uses in regression.
● Role of forecasting in business.
● Probability distribution and their characteristics.
● Poisson distribution and its uses.
● Hypothesis testing terminologies.

Numerical
Numerical on missing frequencies.
● Find the missing frequency in the following distribution if N is 60 and the median is 40.
0--10 10--30 30--60 60--80 80--90
5 x y 8 2

● If the median of the following frequency distribution is 46. find the absolute difference
of missing frequencies

10− 20− 30− 40− 50− 60− 70− Tot

● Variable
20 30 40 50 60 70 80 al

22
Frequency 12 30 f1 65 f2 25 18
9

● Find the missing frequencies f1 and f2 in the following frequency distribution

table.N=100 and median is 32.

0− 10− 20− 30− 40− 50− Tot

Class
10 20 30 40 50 60 al

Frequen 10 f1 25 30 f2 10 10
cy 0

The numbers 3, 5.8, 8 and 4.5 have the frequencies x, x+2, x-3 and x+6 respectively. If the
arithmetic mean is 4.8 find the value of x. 

● An incomplete frequency distribution is given below Median value is 46, the missing
frequency is

Varia Frequen
te cy

10−2
12
0

20−3
30
0

30−4
?
0

40−5
65
0

50−6
45
0

60−7
25
0

70−8
18
0

Total 229

● An incomplete distribution is given below:

10− 20− 30− 40− 50− 60− 70−

Variable
20 30 40 50 60 70 80

Frequen
12 30 − 65 − 25 18
cy

You are given that the median value is 46 and the total number of items is 230.
Using the median formula fill up the missing frequencies.

● The mean of 8, 11, 6, 14, x and 13 is 66. Find the value of the observation x.

● The mean of 6, 8, x + 2, 10, 2x - 1, and 2 is 9. Find the value of x and also the value of the
observation in the data.

Measures of Dispersion

● Two samples of sizes 60 and 90 have 52 and 48 as the respective arithmetic means and 9
and 12 as the respective standard deviations. Find standard deviation of the combined
sample of size 150.
● A sample of size 15 has mean 3.5 and standard deviation 3.0. Another sample of size 22 has
mean 4.7 and standard deviation 4.0. If the two samples are pooled together, find the mean
and the standard deviation of the combined sample.

● Coefficient of variations of two series are 58% and 69%. their standard deviations are 21.2
and 15.6. Find out their arithmetic means.

● The scores of two batsmen A and B in 10 innings during a certain season are as follows: 

A 25  28  35  32  31  36  29  38  34  32

B 43  46  49  41  36  32  31 30  33  39

Find which of the batsman is more consistent in scoring.

Correlation and regression

The finance manager of Crystal Technologies Ltd. Has collected the following data from past
records:                                                                                                                            
Average receivable balance (Rs. In Bad Debts (Rs. In’000)
lakh)
49 94
54 180
56 118
60 130
64 130
71 180
0. Draw a scatter diagram to show the correlation
a. The coefficient of correlation between average receivables balance and bad debts? 
b. The percentage of variations in bad debts that is explained by the variations in average
receivables balance?    
c. What is the percentage of variations in bad debts that remains unexplained?     
● Find the regression of x and y from the following data :

∑x = 24

∑y = 44

∑x 2 = 164

∑y 2 = 574

∑xy = 306

n = 42

● You are given variance of x = 9. The regression equations are 8x – 10y + 80 = 0 and

40x – 18y = 416.

Compute :

(a) Average values of x and y :

(b) Standard deviation of y. 

● Compute Carl Pearson and Spearman’s coefficient of correlation for the following two
variables in the following data. Compare the results. Draw a scatter plot to visualize the
distribution.

x 123 142 111 132 121 120 121 118 116

y 22 31 21 24 25 23 22 28 34

Probability Theory

● Three boxes of the same appearance have the following properties of white & black balls:  

 Box I    :    1  white   and  2  black  

Box II   :     2 white and 1  black
Box III  :     2 white  and  2  black
 One of the boxes is selected at random & one ball is drawn randomly from it. It turns out to be
white. What is the probability that the third box is chosen?
● Sougata is known to hit a target in 5 out of 9 shots whereas Ankan is known to hit the same
target in 6 out of 11 shots. What is the probability that the target would be hit once they
both try?

● A box contains 40 bulbs out of which 5 are defectives. A customer draws a sample of three
bulbs at random one after the other. If the sample contains even 1 defective bulb the box is
rejected. What is the probability that the box is not rejected?

● From the past experience it is known that a machine is set up correctly on 90% of occasions.
If the machine is set up correctly then 92% of the good parts are expected. But if the
machine is not set up correctly then the probability of a good part is only 35%. On a
particular day the machine is set up and the first component produced found to be good. 
What is the probability that the machine is set up correctly?

● The probability of a bomb hitting a target is 2/5. Four direct hits are necessary to destroy a
bridge completely. If 6 bombs are aimed at the bridge, what is the probability that the
bridge will be destroyed?

● Let’s say that 80% of all business startups in the IT industry report that they generate a
profit in their first year. If a sample of 10 new IT business startups is selected, find the
probability that exactly seven will generate a profit in their first year.

● Your basketball team is playing a series of 5 games against your opponent. The winner is
those who wins more games (out of 5).

Let assume that your team is much more skilled and has 75% chances of winning. It means
there is a 25% chance of losing.

What is the probability of your team get 3 wins?

● A box of candies has many different colors in it. There is a 15% chance of getting a pink
candy. What is the probability that exactly 4 candies in a box are pink out of 10?

● An average of 0.61 soldiers died by horse kicks per year in each Prussian army corps.
You want to calculate the probability that exactly two soldiers died in the VII Army Corps
in 1898, assuming that the number of horse kick deaths per year follows a Poisson
distribution.

● A life insurance salesman sells on the average 33 life insurance policies per week. Use
Poisson's law to calculate the probability that in a given week he will sell

a. At least 5 policies
b. Exactly 22 policies
● For some computers, the time period between charges of the battery is normally
distributed with a mean of 50 hours and a standard deviation of 15 hours. Rohan has
one of these computers and needs to know the probability that the time period will be
between 50 and 70 hours.

● The speeds of cars are measured using a radar unit, on a motorway. The speeds are
normally distributed with a mean of 90 km/hr and a standard deviation of 10 km/hr.
What is the probability that a car selected at chance is moving at more than 100 km/hr?

● Most graduate schools of business require applicants for admission to take the
Graduate Management Admission Council’s GMAT examination. Scores on the GMAT
are roughly normally distributed with a mean of 527 and a standard deviation of 112.
What is the probability of an individual scoring above 500 on the GMAT?

● A group of students with normally distributed salaries earn an average of $6,800 with
a standard deviation of $2,500. What proportion of students earnbetween $6,500 and
$7,300?