Math Problem Statement
A student takes a 50 question true/false test.
What is the expected number of correct answers if the student guesses on every question?
Let X = number of questions students gets correct on the test.
n = . Enter the Exact Value.
p = . Write as a decimal, one decimal place. Example 0.3
= . Enter the Exact Value.
= . Write as a decimal, rounded to 3 decimal places. For example: 0.3456 enter as 0.346
Expected Number of Successes = Enter the Exact Value.
Using mean and standard deviation, what is the lowest number of correct answers that would be considered usual? Round to the nearest whole number.
Would a student correctly scoring 35 correct out of 50 on the test be unusually high?
Enter Y for yes or N for no.
Solution
Let's work through the problem step-by-step.
Step 1: Identify the distribution
Since the student is guessing on each true/false question, the situation can be modeled using the binomial distribution, where:
- (the total number of questions),
- (the probability of answering any single question correctly, since each question has two options and guessing means there's a 50% chance).
Step 2: Mean and Standard Deviation
For a binomial distribution, the mean and standard deviation are given by:
- Mean
- Standard deviation
Let's compute these:
Now, calculate the exact values.
Calculations:
- (Expected number of correct answers)
- (Rounded to three decimal places)
Step 3: Usual Range
To determine what would be considered "usual," we define the usual range as being within two standard deviations of the mean. So, we calculate:
- Lowest usual number: (Rounded to the nearest whole number)
- Highest usual number: (Rounded to the nearest whole number)
So, a "usual" number of correct answers would be between 18 and 32.
Step 4: Is 35 correct answers unusually high?
Since 35 correct answers is greater than 32 (the upper bound of the usual range), a student getting 35 correct answers would be considered unusually high.
Thus, the answer to the last question is Y (Yes).
Final Answers:
- Lowest usual number of correct answers: 18
- Is 35 unusually high? Y
Do you want more details or have any questions?
Related Questions:
- What is the probability that a student gets exactly 30 questions correct by guessing?
- What is the probability that a student gets fewer than 20 questions correct?
- If the student guesses on 100 questions instead of 50, what would the new mean and standard deviation be?
- How would the probabilities change if the test was a multiple-choice test with 4 options per question?
- How can we calculate the probability that a student gets more than 40 correct answers by guessing?
Tip:
In a binomial distribution, when the probability of success is 0.5 (like in true/false tests), the distribution is symmetric around the mean, making the calculations simpler.
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Math Problem Analysis
Mathematical Concepts
Binomial Distribution
Probability
Standard Deviation
Mean
Formulas
Mean: μ = n * p
Standard Deviation: σ = sqrt(n * p * (1 - p))
Usual Range: μ ± 2σ
Theorems
Binomial Theorem
Suitable Grade Level
Grades 9-12
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