Assignment No. 2 ---------------- Question 1 ---------- A survey report states that 70% of adult women visit their doctors for physical examination at least once in two years. If 19 adult women are randomly selected, find the probability that (a) fewer than 14 of them have had a physical examination in the past two years; (b) at least 17 of them have had a physical examination in the past two years. Compute the required probabilities exactly (i.e., use statistical tables) and approximately (i.e., use normal approximations) and compare your results. Question 2 ---------- The strength of cardboard mailing tubes (as measured by the force required to puncture them with a sharp object) is normally distributed with mean 32 lbs and standard deviation 4 lbs. (a) What is the probability that a tube will puncture if it is struct by a 25 lb blow with the object? (b) Find the 99-th percentile of the given normal distribution and interpret your result. Question 3 ---------- In a study of the nutritional qualities of fast foods, the amount of fat was measured for a random sample of 25 hamburgers of a particular restaurant chain. The mean and standard deviation were found to be 30.2 and 3.8 grams, respectively. Past experience suggests that fat content in hamburgers follow a normal distribution. (a) Use the given summary statistics to construct a 95% confidence interval for the average fat content in hamburgers served in these restaurants. (b) Suppose you are now told that it is known that the variance for the amount of fat in a hamburger is 16 gm^2. How does this affect your calculation of the required confidence interval? Question 4 ---------- A medical researcher conjectures that smoking can result in wrinkled skin around the eyes. By observing 150 smokers and 250 nonsmokers, the researcher finds that 95 of the smokers and 103 of the nonsmokers have prominent wrinkles around their eyes. (a) Suggest an appropriate estimand for this problem and obtain a 90% confidence interval for it. (b) Do these data substantiate the belief that prominent wrinkles around the eyes are more prevalent among smokers than nonsmokers? (c) If the results are statistically significant, can the researcher readily conclude that smoking causes wrinkles around the eyes? Why or why not?