Lecture 6:

Chapter 6: Normal Probability Distributions

A normal distribution is a continuous probability distribution for a random

variable x. The graph of a normal distribution is called the normal curve. A
normal distribution has the following properties.
1.
2.
3.
4.

The mean, median, and mode are equal.

The normal curve is bell shaped and is symmetric about the mean.
The total are under the normal curve is equal to one.
The normal curve approaches, but never touches, the x-axis as it extends
farther and farther away from the mean.
5. Between
and
(in the center of curve) the graph curves
downward. The graph curves upward to the left of

and to the right of

The points at which the curve changes from curving upward to

curving downward are called inflection points.
6. The Empirical Rule: Approximately 68% of the area under the normal curve
is between
and
. Approximately 95% of the area under the
normal curve is between

and

area under the normal curve is between

. Approximately 99.7% of the

and

6-2 The standard Normal Distribution

Def: The standard normal distribution is a normal probability distribution that
has a mean of 0 and a standard deviation of 1.
Finding Area under the Standard Normal curve using Table A-2:
When using table A-2, it is essential to understand the following points.
I)
II)

Table A-2 is designed only for the standard normal distribution, which has a
mean of 0 and a standard deviation of 1.
Each value in the body of the table is the cumulative area from the left op
to a vertical line above a specific value of z. Recall: the z-score allows us
to transform a random variable x with mean and standard deviation
into a random variable z.

with mean 0 and standard deviation of 1.

III)

IV)

When this transformation takes place, the area that falls in the interval
under the nonstandard normal curve is the same as that under the
standard normal curve with the corresponding z-boundaries.
Table A-2 is on two pages. One for positive z scores and one for negative z
scores.

Example 1: Find the indicated area under the standard normal curve.
a)
b)
c)
d)
e)
f)
g)

Between z=0 and z = 1.96

To the right of z = 1.64
To the left of z = 1.54
To the right of z = -0.95
To the left of z =-2.57
Between z=-0.44 and z = 1.66
Between z =1.66 and z = 2.97

Notation:
P(a<z<b) denotes the probability that the z score is between a and b.
P (z>a) denotes the probability that the z score is greater than a.
Note: P(z>a) = 1 - p(z<a)
P(z<a) denotes the probability that the z-score is less than a.
P(z=a) = 0 the probability of getting any single exact value is 0.
Finding z scores with given probabilities:
Example 2: P(0<z<b) = 0.4923

P(a<z<0) = 0.3925

P(z<a) = 0.3132

Example 3: Find the z score so that the area to the left of the z score is 0.32.
Remember that if the area to the left of the z sore is less than 0.5, the z score
must be less than 0. If the area to left of the z score is greater than 0.5, the z
score must be greater than 0.
Example 4: Find the z score so that the area to the right of the z score is 0.4322.

Example 5: Find the z scores that divide the middle 90% of the area in the
standard normal distribution from the area in the tails.
Example 6: Find the z score that divides the bottom 95% from the top 5%.
For z scores above 3.49, use 0.9999 as an approximation of the cumulative area
from the left. For z scores below -3.49, use 0.0001 as an approximation of the
cumulative area from the left.
6-3 Applications of Normal distributions:
The standard score, or z score, represents the number of standard deviation a
random variable, x, falls from the mean To transform the random variable to a
z score, use

(round to 2 decimal places).

Example 7: a survey was conducted to measure the height of American males. In

the survey, respondents were grouped by age. In the 20-29 age group, the
heights were normally distributed, with a mean of 69.2 inches and a standard
deviation of 2.9 inches. A study participant is randomly selected.
a) Find the probability that his height is less than 66 inches.
b) Find the probability that his height is between 66 and 72 inches.
c) Find the probability that his height is more than 72 inches.
Transforming a z score to an x value:
(Make z negative if it is to the left of the mean.)
Example 8: Scores for a civil service exam are normally distributed, with a mean
of 75 and a standard deviation of 6.5. To be eligible for civil service employment,
you must score in the top 5%. What is the lowest score you can earn and still be
eligible for employment?
Example 9: The lengths of pregnancies are normally distributed with a mean of
268 days and a standard deviation of 15 days. If we stipulate that a baby is

premature if the length of pregnancy is in the lowest 4%, find the length that
separates premature babies form those who are not premature.
Example 10: a pediatrician obtains the heights of her 200 3-year-old female
patients. The heights are approx. normally distributed, with mean 38.72 in and
standard deviation of 3.17 in. Use the normal model to a) determine the
proportion of the 3-year-old females that have a height less than 35 inches. b)
Find the percentile rank of a 3-year-old female whose height is 43 inches. Hint:
the kth percentile dives the lower k% of a data set from the upper (100-k)%. c)
Compute the probability that a randomly selected 3-year-old female is between
35 and 40 inches tall, inclusive. d) Find the height of a 3-year-old female at the
20thpercentile. E) Determine the heights that separate the middle 98% of the
distribution.
6-4 Sampling Distributions and Estimators
In this section, we will study the relationship between a population mean and the
means of samples taken from the population.
Def: The sampling distribution of the mean is the probability distribution of
sample means, with all samples having the same sample size n.
Example 11: A population consists of the values 1, 2, 5.
a) Find the population mean.
b) List all of the possible samples (with replacement) of size n=2 along with the
sample means and their individual probabilities.
c) Find the mean of the sampling distribution of means.
d) Do the sample means target the value of the population mean?
In general, the distribution of sample means will have a mean equal to the
population mean. Sample means therefore tend to target the population mean.
Example 12: For the population of 1, 2, 5.
a) Find the population proportion of odd numbers.

b) List all of the possible samples (with replacement) of size n=2 along with the
sample proportions of odd numbers and their individual probabilities.
c) Find the mean of the sampling distribution of proportions.
d) Do the mean of sampling distribution of proportions for odd numbers target
the value of the population proportion for odd numbers?
In general, the sampling distribution of proportions will have a mean that is equal
to the population proportion.
If some of sample statistics are good to target the population parameter, then we
call them unbiased estimators.
Mean, variance, and proportion are unbiased estimators. The statistics that do
not target population parameter are median, range, and standard deviation. The
bias is relatively small in large samples for standard deviation, thus s is often used
to estimate .
As you have noticed, for small samples we have used sampling with replacement;
however sampling without replacement would avoid wasteful duplication. We
are interested in sampling with replacements because a) if the sample size is
relatively smaller than the large population, then there is no significant difference
between sampling with replacement or without replacement. b) Sampling with
replacement results in independent events, and independent events are easier to
analyze and they result in simpler formulas.
Example 13: Try #9 on section 6-4
6-5 The Central Limit Theorem
1. If samples of size n, where n>30, are drawn from any population with a
mean and a standard deviation of , then the sampling distribution of
sample means approximates a normal distribution. The greater the sample
size, the better the approximation.
2. If the population itself is normally distributed, the sampling distribution of
sample means is normally distributed for any sample size n. In either case,

the sampling distribution of sample means has a mean equal to the

population mean. =
3. And the sampling distribution of sample means has a variance equal to 1/n
times the variance of the population and a standard deviation equal to the
population standard deviation divided by the square root of n.
The standard deviation of the sample means is often called the standard error of
the mean.
Probability and the Central Limit Theorem
We can find the probability that a sample mean, , will fall in a given interval of
the sampling distribution. To transform to a z score, you can use the equation

Example 14: The mean rent of an apartment in a professionally managed

apartment building is $780. You randomly select nine professionally managed
apartments. What is the probability that the mean rent is less than $825?
Assume that the rents are normally distributed, with a standard deviation of
$150.
Example 15: Credit card balances are normally distributed, with a mean of $2870
and a standard deviation of $900. A) What is the probability that a randomly
selected credit card holder has a credit card balance less than $2500? B) You
randomly select 25 credit card holders. What is the probability that their mean
credit card balance is less than $2500?
Example 16: During a certain week the mean price of gasoline in the New England
region was
0 per gallon. What is the probability that the mean price
for a sample of 32 randomly selected gas stations in that area was between
$1.075 and $1.090 that week? Assume the standard deviation is $0.045

Example 17: Try it yourself #16 on section 6-5