Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

ADVANCED COMPUTER
PROGRAMMING &
STATISTICS

Sampling Distributions and Estimation

Telecommunications Engineering
Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Lecture 3: Sampling Distributions &

Estimation

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 2

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 3

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Census vs. Sample
• A sample is a representative subset of a population. If a statistician or other researcher
wants to know some information about a population, the only way to be truly sure is to
conduct a census.
• In a census, every unit in the population being studied is measured or surveyed. If we
really wanted to know the true approval rating of the president, for example, we would
have to ask every single Nigerian adult his or her opinion.
• There are some obvious reasons why a census is impractical in this case, and in most
situations.

Why is this impractical?

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 4
Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

• First, it would be extremely expensive for the polling
organization. They would need an extremely large workforce
to try and collect the opinions of every Nigerian adult.
• Also, it would take many workers and many hours to organize,
interpret, and display this information.
• Even if it could be done in several months, by the time the
results were published, it would be very probable that recent
events had changed peoples’ opinions and that the results
would be obsolete.

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 5

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

• In addition, a census has the potential to be destructive to the
population being studied. For example, many manufacturing
companies test their products for quality control.
• A padlock manufacturer might use a machine to see how
much force it can apply to the lock before it breaks. If they
did this with every lock, they would have none left to sell!
• Likewise, it would not be a good idea for a biologist to find
the number of fish in a lake by draining the lake and counting
them all!

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 6

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Sampling and Its Risks
• Due to all of the difficulties associated with a census, sampling is much
more practical.
• However, it is important to understand that even the most carefully
planned sample will be subject to random variation between the sample
and the population.
• Recall that these differences due to chance are called sampling error.
Opinion polls, like the New York Times poll, tend to refer to this as
margin of error.
• You will learn how to calculate sampling error, or the margin of error,
associated with samples in the next section
Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 7
Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

• The second statement quoted from the New York Times article
mentions another problem with sampling.
• That is, it is often difficult to obtain a sample that accurately
reflects the total population.
• It is also possible to make mistakes in selecting the sample
and collecting the information.
• These problems result in a non-representative sample, or one
in which our conclusions differ from what they would have
been if we had been able to conduct a census.

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 8

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Bias in Samples and Surveys
• The term most frequently applied to a non-representative
sample is bias. Bias has many potential sources.
• It is important when selecting a sample or designing a survey
that a statistician make every effort to eliminate potential
sources of bias.
• In this section, we will discuss some of the most common
types of bias. While these concepts are universal, the terms
used to define them here may be different than those used in
other sources.
Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 9
Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Sampling Bias
• In general, sampling bias refers to the methods used in
selecting the sample.
• The sampling frame is the term we use to refer to the group or
listing from which the sample is to be chosen.
• If you wanted to study the population of students in your
school, you could obtain a list of all the students from the
office and choose students from the list.
• This list would be the sampling frame.

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 10

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Incorrect Sampling Frame
• If the list from which you choose your sample does not accurately reflect the
characteristics of the population, this is called incorrect sampling frame.
• A sampling frame error occurs when some group from the population does not have the
opportunity to be represented in the sample.
• For example, surveys are often done over the telephone. You could use the telephone
book as a sampling frame by choosing numbers from the telephone book.
• However, some phone numbers are not listed in the telephone book. In addition,
younger adults in particular tend to only use their cell phones or computer-based phone
services and may not even have traditional phone service.
• Even if you picked phone numbers randomly, the sampling frame could be incorrect,
because there are also people, especially those who may be economically
disadvantaged, who have no phone.

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 11

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

• There is absolutely no chance for these individuals to be represented in
your sample.
• A term often used to describe the problems when a group of the
population is not represented in a survey is undercoverage.
• Undercoverage can result from all of the different sampling biases.
• You may have heard of one of the most famous examples of sampling
frame error. It occurred during the 1936 U.S. presidential election.
• The Literary Digest, a popular magazine at the time, conducted a poll
and predicted that Alf Landon would win the election. As it turned out,
the election was won in a landslide by Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 12

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 13

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 14

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Response Bias
The term response bias refers to problems that result from the ways in
which the survey or poll is actually presented to the individuals in the
sample.

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 15

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 16

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 17

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 18

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 19

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 20

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 21

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 22

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 23

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 24

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 25

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 26

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Surveys and Sampling

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 27

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Sampling Distribution

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 28

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Sampling Distribution

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 29

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Sampling Distribution

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 30

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Sampling Distribution

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 31

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Sampling Distribution

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 32

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Sampling Distribution

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 33

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Sampling Distribution

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 34

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Sampling Distribution

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 35

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Sampling Distribution

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 36

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Sampling Distribution

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 37

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Sampling Distribution

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 38

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Sampling Distribution

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 39

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Central Limit Theorem

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 40

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Central Limit Theorem

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 41

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Central Limit Theorem

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 42

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Central Limit Theorem

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 43

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Central Limit Theorem

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 44

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Central Limit Theorem

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 45

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Central Limit Theorem

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 46

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Central Limit Theorem

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 47

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Central Limit Theorem

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 48

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Law of Large Numbers

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 49

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
 Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Law of large numbers

• Law of large numbers, in statistics, the theorem that, as the number of identically distributed,
randomly generated variables increases, their sample mean (average) approaches their theoretical
mean.

• The law of large numbers was first proved by the Swiss mathematician Jakob Bernoulli in 1713. He
and his contemporaries were developing a formal probability theory with a view toward analyzing
games of chance.

• Bernoulli envisaged an endless sequence of repetitions of a game of pure chance with only two
outcomes, a win or a loss.

• Labeling the probability of a win p, Bernoulli considered the fraction of times that such a game would
be won in a large number of repetitions.

• It was commonly believed that this fraction should eventually be close to p. This is what Bernoulli
proved in a precise manner by showing that, as the number of repetitions increases indefinitely, the
probability of this fraction being within any prespecified distance from p approaches 1.
Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 50
Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
 Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Law of large numbers

• The law of large numbers is closely related to what is commonly called the law of averages.
• In coin tossing, the law of large numbers stipulates that the fraction of heads will eventually
be close to 1/2.
• Hence, if the first 10 tosses produce only 3 heads, it seems that some mystical force must
somehow increase the probability of a head, producing a return of the fraction of heads to
its ultimate limit of 1/2.
• Yet the law of large numbers requires no such mystical force. Indeed, the fraction of heads
can take a very long time to approach ½.
• For example, to obtain a 95 percent probability that the fraction of heads falls between 0.47
and 0.53, the number of tosses must exceed 1,000.
• In other words, after 1,000 tosses, an initial shortfall of only 3 heads out of 10 tosses is
swamped by results of the remaining 990 tosses.

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code EEE504 51

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada
Faculty of Engineering Baze University Abuja

Telecommunications Engineering Course Code504 52

Department By Abdullahi Yusuf Sada