Probability plays an integral role in

inferential statistics by building a

PROBABILITY "bridge" between the population and the
sample taken from it.
Probability is a measure of the likelihood of an
event to occur. Many events cannot be predicted
with total certainty.
Using probability, one can predict only the chance
of an event to occur, i.e., how likely they are
going to happen.
INTRODUCTION
As an example of the use of probability in this context, consider the national election for the
office of president of the Philippines. Let us suppose that only two candidates are listed on the
ballot for the presidency,
Democratic candidate (A), Leni Robredo
Republican candidate (B) , Bong bong Marcos
Further, suppose it is known in the population of registered persons who will vote on election day
that 60% will vote for A and 40% will vote for B.
If we now randomly sample one person from this population, what is the probability that he or
she will vote for A?
Since we know that 60% of the persons will vote for A, the probability that the one sampled
person will vote for A is 0.60.
The Sample and Event Spaces
Suppose we assign a "1" to an individual if he or she intends to vote for candidate A, and "0" if he
or she intends to vote for candidate B. The population can then be thought of as a collection of
ones and zeroes. The process of contacting each person to determine the outcome ("1" or "0") is
called an experiment.
Experiment
An experiment is a process which results in one and only one outcome of a set of disjoint
outcomes, where the outcomes cannot be predicted with certainty.

By repeating an experiment many times, a population of outcomes can be generated.

The outcomes of an experiment are called SIMPLE EVENTS. Simple events shall be denoted by
the capital letter E subscripted to associate E; with a particular outcome (ith) of an experiment.
SIMPLE EVENTS
A simple event is the outcome of an experiment.
Example 1.
Suppose in our presidential election example that we randomly sample two persons in the
population of voters
A possible set of simple events associated with this experiment is:
Example 2.
Suppose three persons, A, B, and C, are interviewing for a job. Two will be hired. The
experiment is the selection of two of the three interviewed individuals for the job. The
simple events can be listed using an outcome tree as illustrated in the figure.

In this case, a simpler set of outcomes

would be:
Example 3.
Assume that Herman is to toss a "fair coin" twice. He informs you that there are three possible outcomes
(simple events) of this experiment:

Herman tells you that the probability of any one of the three simple events occurring is 1/3.
He then wishes to wager with you on the outcome of one trial of the experiment.
Before deciding to accept a wager, you construct an outcome tree of a single trial of the experiment.
From the outcome tree, it is clear that we may define another set of simple events for this experiment:
BASIC EVENT RELATIONS AND PROBABILITY LAWS
Mutually exclusive
Two events A and B are said to be mutually exclusive if (when the experiment is
performed a single time) the occurrence of one of the events excludes the
possibility of the occurrence of the other event.
example
1.A pair of dice is to be tossed once, find the probability of tossing a
sum less than or equal to 4, this probability is

For example, when we toss a pair of dice, the sum S of the numbers
appearing on the dice can assume any one of the values S = 2, 3, 4,...,
11, 12.
On a single toss of the dice, we can observe only one of these values.
Therefore, the values 2, 3, . . . , 12 represent mutually exclusive events.
If we want to find the probability of tossing a sum less than or equal to
4, this probability is
In other words, for this experiment, the possible outcomes are

Therefore,
Complement
The complement of an event A is the event that A does not occur. The complement of A
is denoted by the symbol .

Simply, it requires that the probabilities assigned to all the simple events in the
experiment must total one.
For an example, refer again to the two-coin-toss experiment. If, in many repetitions of
the experiment, the proportion of times you observe event A, “two heads show,” is 1/4,
then it follows that the proportion of times you observe the event , “two heads do not
show,” is 3/4. Thus, P(A) and P() will always sum to 1.
Union
The union of two events A and B is the set of all outcomes that are included in
either A or B (or both). The union is denoted as .
() = P (A) + P(B) – P (A B)
Intersection
The intersection of two events A and B is the set of all outcomes that are included
in both A and B. The intersection is denoted as
example
Events and event probabilities are shown in the Venn diagram below. Use this diagram to
determine the following probabilities
a. )
b. )
c. )
d. )
Conditional Probability
The conditional probability, as its name suggests, is the probability of happening an event that is
based upon a condition.
example
1. assume that the probability of a boy playing tennis in the evening is 95% (0.95) whereas the
probability that he plays given that it is a rainy day is less which is 10% (0.1). Then the former case is
just normal probability whereas the latter case is the conditional probability. In this example, we
represent the two probabilities as P(Play tennis) = 0.95 and P(Play tennis | Rainy day) = 0.1.
2. From the table give, find the probability of a fraudulent fire claim?
P(F)= probability of fraudulent claim P(F|fire policy)= probability of fraudulent claim associated w/
fire policy
Consider two events A and B with nonzero probabilities, P(A) and P(B).
The conditional probability of event A given event B is

The conditional probability of event B given event A is

The probability of the intersection of two events A and B is

m.n rule
The fundamental counting principle is a rule which counts all the possible ways
for an event to happen or the total number of possible outcomes in a situation.
It states that when there are n ways to do one thing, and m ways to do another
thing, then the number of ways to do both the things can be obtained by taking
their product. This is expressed as n×m or mxn
example:
Herman has decided to purchase a new hi-fi system with the money he saved by buying a
compact car instead of a large sedan. His hi-fi system will be composed of a receiver, a
pair of speakers, a record changer, and a tape deck. In the store where he will make the
purchase, there are 10 different kinds of receivers, 5 kinds of speakers, 4 kinds of
changers, and 8 kinds of tape decks. How many systems can Herman choose from?
receivers= 10
SOLUTION:
speakers= 5
chargers= 4 Since he must select one element from each of the four groups, he
can choose from (10)(5)(4)(8) = 1600 possible systems.
tape Decks= 8
Permutation is an ordered arrangement of r distinguishable objects. The number of
permutations of r objects taken from n distinguishable objects will be denoted by .
For instance, how many different ordered arrangements of the letters a, b,c are possible?
By direct enumeration we see that there are 6; namely, abc, acb, bac, bca, cab, cba.
An arrangement of objects in a definite order
example:
1.) A club committee of three is to be formed by selecting three people from a group of
five. One of the selected people will be chosen a chairman of the committee, another the
secretary, and the third person will simply be a "member" of the committee. How many
different committees can be formed?
SOLUTION:
Suppose the three people (denoted by A, B, and C, respectively) have been chosen
from among the five. Once we have this combination of three people, we must then
assign them to the three positions: chairman, secretary, and member
We can view this process as ordering the three persons. That is, let the first position in
the ordering (or permutation) be the chairman, the second be the secretary, and the
third be the member.
The possible permutations are: ABC, ACB, BAC, BCA, CAB, and CBA.
Each of these combinations is a different committee, although each contains the same
three people, A, B, and C.
Thus, we want to compute the number of permutations of r = 3 people chosen from n = 5.
2. In how many ways can 5 different 3. How many ways can 6 people be lined
trees be planted up to get on a bus?

a. If a certain 3 persons insist on

a. In a row following each other?
N= n! N= 4! x 3!
N= 5! N= 144
N= 120
b. If certain 2 people refuse to follow
b. In a circle each other?
N= 6! - (5! x 2 )
N= (n-1)! N= 480
N= (5-1)!
4. How many different permutations can be made form the letter in the words
MISSISSIPPI
N = = 34650 ways

5. In how many ways can 7 people be assigned to 1 triple and 2 double rooms

N = = 210 ways
combination is a set of r distinguishable objects. The number of combinations of r
objects taken from n distinguishable objects will be denoted by. It does not involve
the arrangement of objects nor the order of selection
example:
1. A committee of three is to monitor the activities of the local club. The committee is
to be formed by selecting three people from a group of five persons. How many
different committees could be formed?
SOLUTION:
Nothing is mentioned about the order or arrangement of the three selected individuals.

Thus, one committee will be different from another if it has one or more different
people in it. We are only concerned about the content of each group, and therefore we
want to determine the number of combinations of three things taken from five.
2. In how many ways can you color a poster if there are 5 colors available

N = 5C1 + 5C2 + 5C3 + 5C4 + 5C5

N = 31 ways
or
N=
N=
N= 31 ways
Assignment
A committee of size 5 is to be selected from a group of 6 men and 9
women. If the selection is made randomly, what is the probability that the
committee consists of 3 men and 2 women?
Sample problems to solve
DISCREET PROBABILITY
DISTRIBUTIONS
When a random experiment is performed, we are often not interested in all of the
details of the experimental result but only in the value of some numerical quantity
determined by the result. For instance, in tossing dice we are often interested in
the sum of the two dice and are not really concerned about the values of the
individual dice. That is, we may be interested in knowing that the sum is 7 and not
be concerned over whether the actual outcome was (1, 6) or (2, 5) or (3, 4) or (4, 3)
or (5, 2) or (6, 1). Also, a civil engineer may not be directly concerned with the
daily risings and declines of the water level of a reservoir (which we can take as
the experimental result) but may only care about the level at the end of a rainy
season. These quantities of interest that are determined by the result of the
experiment are known as random variable
A random variable is discrete if its set of values is finite or
countably infinite in number.

Examples of discrete variables

1. Number of bushels of apples per tree of a genetically altered apple variety
2. Change in the number of accidents per month at an intersection after a new
signaling device has been installed
3. Number of “dead persons” voting in the last mayoral election in a major
Midwest city
Random Variables and their
Probability Distributions
The probability distribution for a discrete random variable displays the
probability P(y) associated with each value of y. This display can be presented as
a table, a graph, or a formula.
To illustrate, consider the tossing of two coins and let y be the number of heads
observed. Then y can take the values 0, 1, or 2.
we can determine the approximate probability for each value of y, as given in Table

Probability distribution for the number of heads when two coins are tossed
Probability distribution for the number of heads when two coins are tossed
Properties of Discrete Random Variables

1. The probability associated with every value of y lies between 0 and 1.

2. The sum of the probabilities for all values of y is equal to 1.
3. The probabilities for a discrete random variable are additive. Hence, the
probability that y = 1 or 2 is equal to P(1) + P(2).
example
A committee of two persons is to be formed from four persons, three of whom are
female. The committee is formed anew at the end of each working week. In any
given week, let X be the number of women serving on the present committee. Form
the probability distribution of the random variable X.

Possible outcomes
X P (X)
1 3/6
2 3/6
Cumulative distribution function
The cumulative distribution function F can be expressed in terms of p(x) by:

If X is a discrete random variable whose set of possible values are x1, x2, x3, ..., where
x1 < x2 < x3 < ··· , then its distribution function F is a step function. That is, the value
of F is constant in the intervals [−1, ) and then takes a step (or jump) of size p() at .
Where a is the random variable
example 2
For instance, suppose X has a probability mass function given by:

then the cumulative distribution function F of X is given by

example 2
Probability Distributions for
Continuous Random Variables
Other random variables are most usefully considered to be continuous: their possible
values form a whole interval (or range, or continuum). For instance, the 1-year return
per dollar invested in a common stock could range from 0 to some quite large value.
Other example is the random variable denoting the lifetime of a car, when the car’s
lifetime is assumed to take on any value in some interval (a, b).
Probability distribution for
a continuous random
variable
The Normal Distribution
The relative frequency histogram for the normal random variable, called the
normal curve or normal probability distribution, is a smooth bell-shaped curve
shown in the figure below. If we let y represent the normal random variable,
then the height of the probability distribution for a specific value of y is
represented by f(y).

µ = mean
 To determine the probability that a
measurement will be less than some value y, we
first calculate the number of standard
deviations that y lies away from the mean by
using the formula

σ - The standard The value of z computed using this formula is

deviation is the average sometimes referred to as the z-score associated
amount of variability in your with the y-value.
dataset. It tells you, on
average, how far each value
lies from the mean.
EXAMPLE:
Consider a normal distribution with µ=20 and σ=2. Determine the probability
that a measurement will be less than 23.
Solution: When first working problems of this type, it might be a good idea to
draw a picture so that you can see the area in question.