Problems on Random Variable

1) A random variable X has the following probability distribution:

X 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
P(x) a 3a 5a 7a 9a 11a 13a 15a 17a
a) Determine the value of a. (Ans:1/81)
b) Find P(X < 3), P(X ≥ 3), P(0 < X < 5) (Ans:9/81, 72/81, 24/81)
c) What is the smallest value of x for which P(X ≤ x) > 0.5
d) Construct cumulative distribution function.

2) A college professor never finishes his lecture before the bell rings to end the period,
and always finishes his lectures within one minute after the bell rings. Let X = the time
which elapses between the bell sand the end of the lecture. Suppose that the p. d. f. of
X is f(x) = kx2, 0 ≤ x ≤ 1
=0 otherwise
a) Find the value of k
b) What is the probability that the lecture ends within ½ minute of the bell ringing?
c) What is the probability that the lecture continues beyond the bell for between 15
and 30 seconds?
d) What is the probability that the lecture continuous for at least 40 seconds
beyond the bell?
3) Suppose the probability density function of weekly gravel sales X (in tons) is
2(1 − 𝑥) 𝑓𝑜𝑟 0 ≤ 𝑥 ≤ 1
f(x) = {
0 𝑜𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑤𝑖𝑠𝑒
a) Obtain c. d. f. of X. (Ans: 2x - x2; 0.75; 0.3125)
b) What is P(X ≤ 0.5);
c) Using (a) Find P(0.25 ≤ X ≤ 0.5)
4) If a random variable X has a function f(x) = 2e-2x for x > 0
0 for x ≤ 0
Then verify that the function is, in fact, a probability density. Hence
a) Find the probabilities that it will take on a value (i) between 1 and 3; (ii)greater
than 0.5 (Ans: 0.1329; 0.3679; 0.8647; ½; 1/4)
b) Find the distribution function and F(1); c) Find the mean and variance.