OUTCOMES, EVENTS, AND PROBABILITY.

EQ: WHAT IS INDEPENDENCE AND CONDITIONAL PROBABILITY?

PROBABILITY VOCABULARY
Probability

Outcome
Sample space Event Compliment

STATISTICS
a range of techniques and procedures for analyzing, interpreting, displaying, and making decisions based on data.

PROBABILITY
A probability experiment is a chance process that leads to well-defined results called outcomes. An outcome is the result of a single trial of a probability experiment.

SAMPLE SPACE
Sample space is a diagram or table that contains all possible outcomes in an event. Hear Ive decided to use a tree diagram to show the sample space for the event of flipping a coin and rolling a die.

INDEPENDENT EVENTS
P(A) is not dependent on P(B)

Ex: If I want to know the probability of getting heads on a coin toss and roll an even number on a die. The probability of getting heads on a coin toss is not affected by the die roll. So the probability of getting a head on a coin toss, P(A), and the probability of getting an even number on a die roll, P(B), are independent events.

DEPENDENT EVENTS
P(A) is dependent on P(B) or P(A|B)

Ex: If I had a deck of cards and wanted to know the probability of drawing all four aces, without replacement.
It is calculated by multiplying the probability of drawing the first ace from 52 cards, 1/52, by the probability of drawing the second ace from 51 cards, 1/51, so-on-&-so-forth, until we get: (4/52)*(3/51)*(2/50)*(1/49)=P(A|B)

PROBABILITY OF A OR B
P(A or B) = P(A) + P(B) P(A and B)

Use only when asked for the Probability of A or B.

Ex: What is the probability of rolling a 3 or a 5 with a pair of fair dice?

PROBABILITY OF A AND B
P(A and B) = P(A) * P(B); iff the two events are independent.

This is our coin and die example

P(A and B) = P(A) * P(B|A); iff the two events are dependent. This is our card drawing w/o replacement example.

PERMUTATIONS

nP r

= n! / (n-r)!

Remember: Order is important!

Ex: If I have applicants for a position, in which I have only four openings, how many different ways can I pick my new employees?
6P 4

= 6! / (6-4)! = (1*2*3*4*5*6) / (1*2) = (3*4*5*6) = 360

I can pick the four new employees 360 different ways.

COMBINATIONS

nC r

= n! / [(n-r)! * r!]

In combinations, order is not Important.

Ex: If this class were to elect a pair of representatives to participate in the student Government, how many different ways can we elect two representatives?
16C 2

= 16! / [(16-2)! * 2!] = 16! / (14! * 2!) = 120

AIMS AND GOALS

Understand independence and conditional probability and use them to interpret data

Use the rules of probability to compute probabilities of compound events in a uniform probability model

References: Microsoft Clipart http://www.dice-collection.com/ http://www.regentsprep.org/