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Discrete Random Variable
Discrete Random Variable
Theorem 8.1: The mean and variance of the discrete uniform distribution f(x; k)
are
k
xi
i 1
(x )
i 1
x = 0,1,2, ,n.
Example 8.2a: The probability that a certain kind of component will survive a
given shock test is . Find the probability that exactly 2 of the next 4 components
tested survive.
Example 8.2b: The probability that a patient recovers from a rare blood disease
is 0.4. If 15 people are known to have contracted this disease, what is the
probability that (a) at least 10 survive (b) from 3 to 8 survive, and (c) exactly 5
survive?
Theorem 8.2 The mean and variance of binomial distribution are
np and 2 npq .
Example 5.6 Find the mean and variance of the binomial random variable of
example 8.2b.
8.1.3: Multinomial Distributions
In a multinomial experiment, each trial have more than two possible
outcomes. If a given trial can result in any one of the k possible outcomes E1,
E2, , Ek with probabilities p1, p2, , pk, then the multinomial distribution will give
the probability that E1 occurs x1 times, E2 occurs x2 times , , and Ek occurs in xk
times in independent trials where
x1 + x2 + + xk = n.
We denote the joint probability distribution by
f(x1, x2, ,xk; p1, p2, , pk,n )
with p1+ p2 ++ pk = 1.
Definition 8.3: The probability distribution of the random variables, X 1, X2, , Xk in
n dependent trials is
p1 1 p 2 2 ... p k
x
x1 , x 2 ..., x k
xk
k
x
N k
nx
,
N
x =0, 1,2,n.
Theorem 8.4: The mean and variance of the hypergeometric distribution are
N n
k
k
nk
2
n 1 .
and
N 1
N
N
N