Part 3 - INFERENCE

Sampling Concepts-contd.

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 Inference About a Population
Proportion
When the population consists of nominal data, the
only inference we can make is about the
proportion of occurrence of a certain value.
The parameter p was used before to calculate
these probabilities under the binomial distribution.

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12.4 Inference About a Population
Proportion
Statistic and sampling distribution
 the statistic used when making inference about p is:

x
p̂  where
n
x  the number of successes .
n  sample size .

– Under certain conditions, [np > 5 and n(1-p) > 5],

p̂ is approximately normally distributed, with
m = p and s2 = p(1 - p)/n. 3
Testing and Estimating the
Proportion
Test statistic for p
p̂  p
Z
p(1  p) / n
where np  5 and n(1  p)  5

• Interval estimator for p (1-a confidence

level)
p̂  z a / 2 p̂(1  p̂) / n
provided np̂  5 and n(1  p̂)  5
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Estimating the Proportion
Nielsen Ratings
 In a survey of 2000 TV viewers at 11.40 p.m. on a
certain night, 226 indicated they watched “The Tonight
Show”.
 Estimate the number of TVs tuned to the Tonight Show
in a typical night, if there are 100 million potential
television sets. Use a 95% confidence level.
 Solution
pˆ  za / 2 pˆ (1  pˆ ) / n  .113  1.96 .113 (1  .113 ) / 2000
.113  .014
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Estimating the Proportion
Solution z - Estimate: Proportion
Viewers
Sample Proportion 0.113
Observations 2000
LCL 0.099
UCL 0.127

A confidence interval estimate of

the number of viewers who watched
the Tonight Show:
LCL = .099(100 million)= 9.9
million
UCL = .127(100 million)=12.7
million 6
 Selecting the Sample Size to
Estimate the Proportion
Recall: The confidence interval for the proportion is

pˆ  za / 2 pˆ (1  pˆ ) / n
Thus, to estimate the proportion to within W, we can
write
W  za / 2 pˆ (1  pˆ ) / n

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 Selecting the Sample Size to
Estimate the Proportion
The required sample size is

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 za / 2 pˆ (1  pˆ ) 
n 
 W 

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Sample Size to Estimate the
Proportion
Example
 Suppose we want to estimate the proportion of customers
who prefer our company’s brand to within .03 with 95%
confidence.
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 Find the sample size.  1.96 p̂(1  p̂) 
n 
 Solution  .03 
W = .03; 1 - a = .95,
therefore a/2 = .025, Since the sample has not yet
been taken, the sample proportion
so z.025 = 1.96
is still unknown.

We proceed using either one of the

following two methods:
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 Sample Size to Estimate the Proportion
Method 1:
 There is no knowledge about the value of p̂
 Let p̂  .5 . This results in the largest possible n needed for a
1-a confidence interval of the form p̂  .03 .
 If the sample proportion does not equal .5, the actual W will be
narrower than .03 with the n obtained by the formula below.
• Method 2:
– There is some idea about the valuep̂of
• Use the value ofp̂ to calculate the sample size

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 1.96 .5(1  .5)  2
n   1,068  1.96 .2(1  .2) 
 .03  n   683
 .03 
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 Further developments
Differences between two means
Differences between two proportions

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