Random Variables
1. What is a random variable?
A) A variable that can only take fixed values.
B) A function that associates a real number with each element in a sample space.
C) A number that describes the spread of data.
D) A function that always gives the same output for a given input.
Answer: B
2. Which of the following is NOT a characteristic of a random variable?
A) Probability Mass Function (P.M.F.)
B) Cumulative Distribution Function (C.D.F.)
C) Standard Deviation
D) Regression Line
Answer: D
Discrete Random Variables
3. A discrete random variable is defined as:
A) A variable with a finite number of outcomes.
B) A variable with an infinite number of uncountable outcomes.
C) A variable that can take any value within a range.
D) A variable whose range is a countable set (finite or infinite).
Answer: D
Probability Mass Function (P.M.F.)
4. Which of the following must be true for a function to be a Probability Mass Function (P.M.F.)?
A) The function can take any real number value.
B) The sum of all probabilities must equal 1.
C) The function must be non-decreasing.
D) The function must be continuous.
Answer: B
Cumulative Distribution Function (C.D.F.)
5. Which of the following properties does a Cumulative Distribution Function (C.D.F.) NOT satisfy?
A) It is a non-decreasing function.
B) F(-∞) = 0.
C) F(∞) = 1.
D) F is always greater than 1.
Answer: D
Expectation
6. What does the expectation E(X) of a random variable X represent?
A) The median of the variable.
B) The most frequently occurring value of the variable.
C) The average value of the variable over the long term.
D) The range of the variable.
Answer: C
Variance
7. Variance of a random variable X is defined as:
A) The square root of the mean.
B) The difference between the highest and lowest values.
C) The measure of dispersion around the mean.
D) The expected value of the squared deviation from the mean.
Answer: D
Sampling Distribution
8. What is a sample in the context of statistics?
A) A set of all elements under investigation.
B) A subset of the population.
C) The mean of the population.
D) The variance of the population.
Answer: B
9. According to the Central Limit Theorem, the distribution of the sample mean for a sufficiently large sample
size (n ≥ 30) is:
A) Uniform.
B) Exponential.
C) Normal.
D) Poisson.
Answer: C
10. The sample mean 𝑋‾X from a normal population with mean μ and variance 𝜎2σ2 follows which distribution?
A) Exponential (λ)
2
σ
B) Normal (μ, )
n
C) Binomial (n, p)
D) Poisson (λ)
Answer: B
11. Which of the following is true for a probability mass function 𝑓(𝑥)?
A) 𝑓(𝑥) can take negative values.
B) 𝑓(𝑥) must satisfy ∑𝑓(𝑥)=1.
C) 𝑓(𝑥) is always a continuous function.
D) 𝑓(𝑥) is not defined for discrete random variables.
Answer: B
12. For a valid P.M.F., what is the minimum value that 𝑓(𝑥)f(x) can take?
A) -1
B) 0
C) 0.5
D) 1
Answer: B
Cumulative Distribution Function (C.D.F.)
13. The value of a cumulative distribution function (C.D.F.) 𝐹(𝑥)F(x) at 𝑥=−∞ is:
A) 0
B) 0.5
C) 1
D) Undefined
Answer: A
14. What does the cumulative distribution function 𝐹(𝑥)F(x) represent?
A) The probability that a random variable takes a value exactly equal to 𝑥x.
B) The probability that a random variable takes a value less than or equal to 𝑥x.
C) The probability that a random variable takes a value greater than 𝑥x.
D) The range of possible values of a random variable.
Answer: B
Expectation and Properties
15. The expectation 𝐸(𝑋)E(X) of a random variable X is also known as the:
A) Variance
B) Standard deviation
C) Mean
D) Mode
Answer: C
16. Which of the following is a linear property of expectation?
Answer: A
Variance and Properties
17. What does the variance 𝑉(𝑋) of a random variable 𝑋 measure?
A) The central tendency of the data.
B) The spread or dispersion of the data.
C) The maximum value in the data.
D) The sum of all data points.
Answer: B
18. The variance 𝑉(𝑋) is given by:
Answer: A
19. If 𝑋X and 𝑌Y are independent random variables, then the variance of their sum 𝑉(𝑋+𝑌) is:
Answer: A
Discrete Random Variables
20. Which of the following is an example of a discrete random variable?
A) The temperature at noon.
B) The number of students in a classroom.
C) The height of students in a classroom.
D) The amount of rainfall in a year.
Answer: B
21. For a discrete random variable 𝑋X, the probability that 𝑋X takes a specific value 𝑥x is given by:
A) The cumulative distribution function (C.D.F.)
B) The probability mass function (P.M.F.)
C) The probability density function (P.D.F.)
D) The variance
Answer: B
Sampling Distribution
22. The law of large numbers states that as the sample size increases:
A) The sample mean will diverge from the population mean.
B) The sample mean will converge to the population mean.
C) The variance of the sample mean will increase.
D) The distribution of the sample mean becomes uniform.
Answer: B
23. Which of the following is a characteristic of a random sample?
A) The observations are dependent.
B) The observations are identically distributed.
C) The sample size is always larger than the population.
D) The sample mean is equal to the population mean.
Answer: B
24. The Central Limit Theorem applies to:
A) The distribution of a single random variable.
B) The distribution of the sum or average of a large number of independent, identically distributed random
variables.
C) The distribution of the variance.
D) The distribution of the range.
Answer: B
Standard Deviation
25. Standard deviation is defined as:
A) The square root of the mean.
B) The square root of the variance.
C) The mean of the data.
D) The median of the data.
Answer: B
Expected Value
29. The expected value 𝐸(𝑋) of a random variable X can be interpreted as:
A) The most frequent value of X.
B) The long-run average value of X.
C) The maximum value of X.
D) The minimum value of X.
Answer: B
30. If X and Y are independent random variables, the expected value of their product is:
A) 𝐸(𝑋+𝑌)
B) 𝐸(𝑋)⋅𝐸(𝑌)
C) 𝐸(𝑋)+𝐸(𝑌)
D) 𝐸(𝑋⋅𝑌)
Answer: B
Continuous Random Variables
31. Which of the following is NOT a characteristic of a continuous random variable?
A) It can take an infinite number of values.
B) It is defined on a continuous scale.
C) Its probability distribution is described by a P.M.F.
D) Its probability distribution is described by a P.D.F.
Answer: C
32. The area under the probability density function (P.D.F.) of a continuous random variable over its entire range
is:
A) 0
B) 1
C) Equal to the mean
D) Equal to the variance
Answer: B
Laws and Theorems
33. According to the Central Limit Theorem, as the sample size 𝑛n increases, the sampling distribution of the
sample mean approaches a:
A) Uniform distribution
B) Normal distribution
C) Binomial distribution
D) Poisson distribution
Answer: B
34. In a sampling distribution, the standard error of the mean is:
A) The standard deviation of the population.
B) The standard deviation of the sample means.
C) The mean of the sample.
D) The variance of the population.
Answer: B
Descriptive Statistics
35. The measure of central tendency that is most affected by extreme values is:
A) Mean
B) Median
C) Mode
D) Range
Answer: A
36. Which measure of dispersion is defined as the average of the squared differences from the mean?
A) Range
B) Standard deviation
C) Variance
D) Interquartile range
Answer: C
