Exam 8: Confidence Interval Estimation

An economist is interested in studying the incomes of consumers in a particular country.The population standard deviation is known to be $1,000.A random sample of 50 individuals resulted in a mean income of $15,000.What is the upper end point in a 99% confidence interval for the average income?

TABLE 8-11 A poll was conducted by the marketing department of a video game company to determine the popularity of a new game that was targeted to be launched in three months.Telephone interviews with 1,500 young adults were conducted which revealed that 49% said they would purchase the new game.The margin of error was ±3 percentage points. -True or False: Referring to Table 8-11,you are 99% confident that the percentage of the targeted young adults who will purchase the new game is somewhere between 46% and 52%.

TABLE 8-10 A sales and marketing management magazine conducted a survey on salespeople cheating on their expense reports and other unethical conduct.In the survey on 200 managers,58% of the managers have caught salespeople cheating on an expense report,50% have caught salespeople working a second job on company time,22% have caught salespeople listing a "strip bar" as a restaurant on an expense report,and 19% have caught salespeople giving a kickback to a customer. -True or False: Referring to Table 8-10,it is possible that the 95% confidence interval calculated from the data will not contain the population proportion of managers who have caught salespeople cheating on an expense report.

TABLE 8-5 A sample of salary offers (in thousands of dollars)given to management majors is: 48,51,46,52,47,48,47,50,51,and 59.Using this data to obtain a 95% confidence interval resulted in an interval from 47.19 to 52.61. -True or False: Referring to Table 8-5,it is possible that the mean of the population is not between 47.19 and 52.61.

TABLE 8-11 A poll was conducted by the marketing department of a video game company to determine the popularity of a new game that was targeted to be launched in three months.Telephone interviews with 1,500 young adults were conducted which revealed that 49% said they would purchase the new game.The margin of error was ±3 percentage points. -Referring to Table 8-11,what is the needed sample size to obtain a 99% confidence interval in estimating the percentage of the targeted young adults who will purchase the new game to within ±5% if you do not have the information on the 49% in the interviews who said that they would purchase the new game?

TABLE 8-3 To become an actuary,it is necessary to pass a series of 10 exams,including the most important one,an exam in probability and statistics.An insurance company wants to estimate the mean score on this exam for actuarial students who have enrolled in a special study program.They take a sample of 8 actuarial students in this program and determine that their scores are: 2,5,8,8,7,6,5,and 7.This sample will be used to calculate a 90% confidence interval for the mean score for actuarial students in the special study program. -True or False: Referring to Table 8-3,for the confidence interval to be valid,it is necessary that test scores of students in the special study program on the actuarial exam be normally distributed.

TABLE 8-5 A sample of salary offers (in thousands of dollars)given to management majors is: 48,51,46,52,47,48,47,50,51,and 59.Using this data to obtain a 95% confidence interval resulted in an interval from 47.19 to 52.61. -True or False: Referring to Table 8-5,95% of all confidence intervals constructed similarly to this one with a sample size of 10 will contain the mean of the population.

The head librarian at the Library of Congress has asked her assistant for an interval estimate of the mean number of books checked out each day.The assistant provides the following interval estimate: from 740 to 920 books per day.If the head librarian knows that the population standard deviation is 150 books checked out per day,approximately how large a sample did her assistant use to determine the interval estimate?

TABLE 8-11 A poll was conducted by the marketing department of a video game company to determine the popularity of a new game that was targeted to be launched in three months.Telephone interviews with 1,500 young adults were conducted which revealed that 49% said they would purchase the new game.The margin of error was ±3 percentage points. -Referring to Table 8-11,1,500 is the size of the

TABLE 8-4 The actual voltages of power packs labeled as 12 volts are as follows: 11.77,11.90,11.64,11.84,12.13,11.99,and 11.77. -Referring to Table 8-4,the critical value for a 99% confidence interval for this sample is ________.

TABLE 8-7 A hotel chain wants to estimate the mean number of rooms rented daily in a given month.The population of rooms rented daily is assumed to be normally distributed for each month with a standard deviation of 240 rooms.During February,a sample of 25 days has a sample mean of 370 rooms. -True or False: Referring to Table 8-7,it is possible that the 99% confidence interval calculated from the data will not contain the sample mean number of rooms rented daily in a given month.

The head librarian at the Library of Congress has asked her assistant for an interval estimate of the mean number of books checked out each day.The assistant provides the following interval estimate: from 740 to 920 books per day.If the head librarian knows that the population standard deviation is 150 books checked out per day,and she asked her assistant to use 25 days of data to construct the interval estimate,what confidence level can she attach to the interval estimate?

TABLE 8-6 After an extensive advertising campaign,the manager of a company wants to estimate the proportion of potential customers that recognize a new product.She samples 120 potential consumers and finds that 54 recognize this product.She uses this sample information to obtain a 95% confidence interval that goes from 0.36 to 0.54. -True or False: Referring to Table 8-6,it is possible that the true proportion of people that recognize the product is not between 0.36 and 0.54.

TABLE 8-2 A quality control engineer is interested in the mean length of sheet insulation being cut automatically by machine.The desired mean length of the insulation is 12 feet.It is known that the standard deviation in the cutting length is 0.15 feet.A sample of 70 cut sheets yields a mean length of 12.14 feet.This sample will be used to obtain a 99% confidence interval for the mean length cut by machine. -True or False: Referring to Table 8-2,the confidence interval is valid only if the lengths cut are normally distributed.

A university system enrolling hundreds of thousands of students is considering a change in the way students pay for their education.Currently,the students pay $400 per credit hour.The university system administrators are contemplating charging each student a set fee of $7,000 per quarter,regardless of how many credit hours each takes.To see if this proposal would be economically feasible,the administrators would like to know how many credit hours,on the average,each student takes per quarter.A random sample of 250 students yields a mean of 14.1 credit hours per quarter and a standard deviation of 2.3 credit hours per quarter.Suppose the administration wanted to estimate the mean to within 0.1 hours at 95% reliability and assumed that the sample standard deviation provided a good estimate for the population standard deviation.How large a total sample would they need to take?

As an aid to the establishment of personnel requirements,the director of a hospital wishes to estimate the mean number of people who are admitted to the emergency room during a 24-hour period.The director randomly selects 64 different 24-hour periods and determines the number of admissions for each.For this sample, = 396 and S = 100.Estimate the mean number of admissions per 24-hour period with a 95% confidence interval.

True or False: The confidence interval estimate of the population mean is constructed around the sample mean.

TABLE 8-6 After an extensive advertising campaign,the manager of a company wants to estimate the proportion of potential customers that recognize a new product.She samples 120 potential consumers and finds that 54 recognize this product.She uses this sample information to obtain a 95% confidence interval that goes from 0.36 to 0.54. -True or False: Referring to Table 8-6,the parameter of interest is 54/120 = 0.45.

TABLE 8-3 To become an actuary,it is necessary to pass a series of 10 exams,including the most important one,an exam in probability and statistics.An insurance company wants to estimate the mean score on this exam for actuarial students who have enrolled in a special study program.They take a sample of 8 actuarial students in this program and determine that their scores are: 2,5,8,8,7,6,5,and 7.This sample will be used to calculate a 90% confidence interval for the mean score for actuarial students in the special study program. -True or False: Referring to Table 8-3,if we use the same sample information to obtain a 95% confidence interval,the resulting interval would be narrower than the one obtained here with 90% confidence.

TABLE 8-13 A wealthy real estate investor wants to decide whether it is a good investment to build a high-end shopping complex in a suburban county in Houston.His main concern is the total market value of the 3,605 houses in the suburban county.He commissioned a statistical consulting group to take a sample of 200 houses and obtained a sample mean market price of $225,000 and a sample standard deviation of $38,700.The consulting group also found out that the mean differences between market prices and appraised prices was $125,000 with a standard deviation of $3,400.Also the proportion of houses in the sample that are appraised for higher than the market prices is 0.24. -Referring to Table 8-13,what will be the 90% confidence interval for the total difference between the market prices and appraised prices of the houses in the suburban county constructed by the consulting group?