1. What is the difference between a population and a sample?

POPULATION In statistics it may refer to individuals that are not necessarily animate. It is the group of data, individuals, specimen, or items from which you are to get your information for your statistical study. Population is also sometimes called universe. It is the full or entire collection to be analyzed or studied. It holds the total subject of interest. Example, the number of people residing in United States of America. refers to a population mean. refers to the standard deviation of a population. 2 refers to the variance of a population. is the population correlation coefficient, based on all of the elements from a population. N is the number of elements in a population. [1] SAMPLE

In statistics, a sample represents a portion of the population you are going to test or study. In other words, it is a subset of the population. It is a slice of it and all of its characteristics. A sample should be randomly drawn so that there are no biases and you will be sure that your sample covers all the characteristics of your chosen population otherwise your result is invalid. It is helpful to get samples because it is difficult to study and obtain your needed information from the entire whole. Example, the number of people who are currently studying in the university of new haven, Connecticut, USA. x refers to a sample mean. s refers to the standard deviation of a sample. s2 refers to the variance of a sample. r is the sample correlation coefficient, based on all of the elements from a sample. n is the number of elements in a sample.[1]

2. Give at least two examples to a symmetric probability distribution A situation in which the values of variables occur at regular frequencies, and the mean, median and mode occur at the same point. A symmetrical distribution is commonly shaped like a bell curve when depicted on a graph. If a line is drawn down the middle of the graph, the two sides will mirror each other. [2]

Example: Daily demand of subs sold in a particular subway shop. : Height of all the basketball players of a particular college

3. What is degrees of freedom? The degrees of freedom are equal to the number of independent observations (N), or the number of subjects in the data, minus the number of parameters (k) estimated. In statistics, the number of degrees of freedom is the number of values in the final calculation of a statistic that are free to vary. [3] Example: Consider the game of baseball. We understand the field-of-play consists of 9 positions. The coach is free to assign any of the 9 players to any of the 9 positions. Once the 8th player is assigned to the 8th position, the 9th player-position is pre-determined, so to speak. In other words, the coach is not free to pick either the last position or the last player. For every position that is assigned, the remaining number of choices (decision options) is decreased by one. In other words, one degreeof-freedom (decision option) is lost every time a position-player decision is made. When considering the last position (and player) there is no choice of selection (or assignment) simply because the total number of positions and players is fixed in advanced (by virtue of the games rules).[4]

4. For a normal probability density function, what does 68-95-99.7% rule represent? In statistics, the 68-95-99.7 rule or three-sigma rule, or empirical rule states that for a normal distribution, nearly all values lie within 3 standard deviations of the mean. X with mean and standard deviation .

The probability that X lies within one standard deviation of the mean is

The probability that X lies within two standard deviations of the mean is

The probability that X lies within three standard deviations of the mean is

Dark blue is less than one standard deviation from the mean. For the normal distribution, this accounts for 68.27% of the set; while two standard deviations from the mean (medium and dark blue) account for 95.45%; and three standard deviations (light, medium, and dark blue) account for 99.73%.[5]

5. [20 pts] In 2008, a university in the Midwestern United States surveyed its fulltime first-year students after they completed their first semester. Surveys were electronically distributed to all 3,727 students, and responses were obtained from 2,821 students. Of the students surveyed, 90.1% indicated that they had studied with other students, and 57.1% indicated that they had tutored another student. The report also noted that 61.3% of the students surveyed came late to class at least once, and 45.8% admitted to being bored in class at least once. a. Describe the population of interest b. Describe the sample that was collected c. Describe a parameter of interest d. Describe the statistic used to estimate the parameter in (c).

(a) All the 3,727 full-time first-year students of the Midwestern United States University. (b) The 2,821 students of the Midwestern United States University who responded to the survey.

(c) The proportion of all 3,727 students who studied with other students of the Midwestern United States University. (d) The proportion of the sample of 2,821 responding students who studied with other students of the Midwestern United States University.