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Home > Statistics Every Writer Should Know > The Stats Board > Discusssion

Help with homework
Message posted by jgsmith on November 1, 2000 at 12:00 AM (ET)

a telemarketer found that there was a 1% chance of a sale from his phone solicitations.find the prob. of getting 5 or more sales for 1000 telephone calls.


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Re: Help with homework
Message posted by Phil on November 1, 2000 at 12:00 AM (ET)

The problem is a pure binomial situation, but I doubt that is what you are expect to do on this problem. The two most likely solutions are to use the Poisson distribution, or the Normal approximation to the Binomial.

Look and see which of those two is most likely based on the chapter, and go from there.

If it is Poisson, then the mean = lambda = np = 0.01 x 1000 = 10

also, keep in mind that the probability of 5 or more = 1 - less than 5!!

Now that you have a hint, you need to do the rest yourself (I have to say that since I am a statistics teacher).


Re: Help with homework
Message posted by JG on November 2, 2000 at 12:00 AM (ET)

If you use the normal approximation the answer is .96 .



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