For top MBA admissions consulting services, contact us.

 info [at] mbacrystalball [dot] com

     

 About  GMAT  B-Schools

 Careers  Services

Probability | Theory, solved examples and Featured Articles

practice questions How to get into

the best MBA
By  MBA Crystal Ball on  July 3, 2015 Tags  Categories 
programs in the
world

When MS and MBA applicants ask us – ‘What are my chances of getting into Guide to Masters
Harvard?‘ or ‘What’s my probability of getting scholarships from Oxford?‘ we get Degree programs
tongue-tied. There are so many variables at play, it’s difficult to give an accurate
answer.

But when you get probability questions in your GMAT exam syllabus, you don’t Best MBA Books
have to get flummoxed. Understanding the basic rules and formulas of
probability will help you score high in the entrance exams.
Beyond The MBA
  Hype

Meaning and definition of Probability

Get the best-selling
As the Oxford dictionary states it, Probability means ‘The extent to which MBA Book that the
something is probable; the likelihood of something happening or being the case’. Top B-School
Admission Officers
In mathematics too, probability indicates the same – the likelihood of the
are praising. Join
occurrence of an event.
thousands who've
Examples of events can be : shattered the hype.
Read more.
Tossing a coin with the head up

Drawing a red pen from a pack of different coloured pens

Business Doctors
Drawing a card from a deck of 52 cards etc.
What happens when
Either an event will occur for sure, or not occur at all. Or there are possibilities to
the Management
different degrees the event may occur.
Consulting world
An event that occurs for sure is called a Certain event and its probability is 1. meets the
Underworld? Read
An event that doesn’t occur at all is called an impossible event and its probability
more
is 0.

This means that all other possibilities of an event occurrence lie between 0 and 1. Download Free MBA
E-book
This is depicted as follows:

0 <= P(A) <= 1 50

MBA TIPS
FOR TOP B-SCHOOLS
where A is an event and P(A) is the probability of the occurrence of the event. Go to
the Free ebook
This also means that a probability value can never be negative. download page.
Every event will have a set of possible outcomes. It is called the ‘sample space’.

Consider the example of tossing a coin. Our Flagship Products

When a coin is tossed, the possible outcomes are Head and Tail. So, the sample
MBA MAP
space is represented as {H, T}.

Similarly when two coins are tossed, the sample space is {(H,H), (H,T), (T,H), (T,T)}. What are your
chances of getting
The probability of head each time you toss the coin is 1/2. So is the probability of
into the best MBA
tail.
programs? Also, find
Basic formula of probability out how you can
improve the odds.
As you might know from the list of GMAT maths formulas, the Probability of the
Read more
occurrence of an event A is defined as:

P(A) = (No. of ways A can occur)/(Total no. of possible outcomes) Career Counselling
 
Take charge of your
Another example is the rolling of dice. When a single die is rolled, the sample
professional life.
space is {1,2,3,4,5,6}.
Find out what's
What is the probability of rolling a 5 when a die is rolled? holding you back
and what you can do
No. of ways it can occur = 1 about it. Read more
Total no. of possible outcomes = 6

So the probability of rolling a particular number when a die is rolled = 1/6. Freebies for you

Compound probability Free GMAT

Compound probability is when the problem statement asks for the likelihood of Practice Test
the occurrence of more than one outcome.
  Free Profile
Evaluation
Formula for compound probability
Free Career
P(A or B) = P(A) + P(B) – P(A and B)
Counselling
where A and B are any two events.
Free Personality
P(A or B) is the probability of the occurrence of atleast one of the events.
Test
P(A and B) is the probability of the occurrence of both A and B at the same time.
Free Career
 
Guidance Tool
Mutually exclusive events:
Mutually exclusive events are those where the occurrence of one indicates the Blog Topics
non-occurrence of the other
GMAT
OR Preparation

When two events cannot occur at the same time, they are considered mutually
MBA Admission
exclusive.
Consultants
Note: For a mutually exclusive event, P(A and B) = 0.
MBA Admissions
 

Example 1: What is the probability of getting a 2 or a 5 when a die is rolled? MBA Financing

Solution: MBA General

Taking the individual probabilities of each number, getting a 2 is 1/6 and so is

MBA Interviews
getting a 5.

Applying the formula of compound probability, MBA Jobs &

Careers
Probability of getting a 2 or a 5,

P(2 or 5) = P(2) + P(5) – P(2 and 5) Masters Degree

==>      1/6 + 1/6 – 0

==>      2/6 = 1/3.

Example 2: Consider the example of finding the probability of selecting a black

card or a 6 from a deck of 52 cards.

Solution:

We need to find out P(B or 6)

Probability of selecting a black card  = 26/52

Probability of selecting a 6                 = 4/52

Probability of selecting both a black card and a 6 = 2/52

P(B or 6)          = P(B) + P(6) – P(B and 6)

= 26/52 + 4/52 – 2/52

= 28/52

= 7/13.

Independent and Dependent Events

Independent Event
When multiple events occur, if the outcome of one event DOES NOT affect the
outcome of the other events, they are called independent events.

Say, a die is rolled twice. The outcome of the first roll doesn’t affect the second
outcome. These two are independent events.
 

Example 1: Say, a coin is tossed twice. What is the probability of getting two
consecutive tails ?

Probability of getting a tail in one toss = 1/2

The coin is tossed twice. So 1/2 * 1/2 = 1/4 is the answer.

Here’s the verification of the above answer with the help of sample space.

When a coin is tossed twice, the sample space is {(H,H), (H,T), (T,H), (T,T)}.

Our desired event is (T,T) whose occurrence is only once out of four possible
outcomes and hence, our answer is 1/4.

Example 2: Consider another example where a pack contains 4 blue, 2 red and 3
black pens. If a pen is drawn at random from the pack, replaced and the process
repeated 2 more times, What is the probability of drawing 2 blue pens and 1 black
pen?

Solution

Here, total number of pens = 9

Probability of drawing 1 blue pen = 4/9

Probability of drawing another blue pen = 4/9
Probability of drawing 1 black pen = 3/9
Probability of drawing 2 blue pens and 1 black pen = 4/9 * 4/9 * 3/9 = 48/729 =
16/243

Dependent Events
When two events occur, if the outcome of one event affects the outcome of the
other, they are called dependent events.

Consider the aforementioned example of drawing a pen from a pack, with a slight
difference.

Example 1: A pack contains 4 blue, 2 red and 3 black pens. If 2 pens are drawn at
random from the pack, NOT replaced and then another pen is drawn. What is the
probability of drawing 2 blue pens and 1 black pen?

Solution:

Probability of drawing 1 blue pen = 4/9

Probability of drawing another blue pen = 3/8
Probability of drawing 1 black pen = 3/7
Probability of drawing 2 blue pens and 1 black pen = 4/9 * 3/8 * 3/7 = 1/14

Let’s consider another example:

Example 2: What is the probability of drawing a king and a queen consecutively

from a deck of 52 cards, without replacement.
Probability of drawing a king = 4/52 = 1/13

After drawing one card, the number of cards are 51.

Probability of drawing a queen = 4/51.

Now, the probability of drawing a king and queen consecutively is 1/13 * 4/51 =
4/663

Conditional probability
Conditional probability is calculating the probability of an event given that
another event has already occured .

The formula for conditional probability P(A|B), read as P(A given B) is

P(A|B) = P (A and B) / P(B)

Consider the following example:

Example: In a class, 40% of the students study math and science. 60% of the
students study math. What is the probability of a student studying science given
he/she is already studying math?

Solution

P(M and S) = 0.40

P(M) = 0.60

P(S|M) = P(M and S)/P(S) = 0.40/0.60 = 2/3 = 0.67

Complement of an event
A complement of an event A can be stated as that which does NOT contain the
occurrence of A.

A complement of an event is denoted as P(Ac) or P(A’).

P(Ac) = 1 – P(A)

or it can be stated, P(A)+P(Ac) = 1

For example,

if A is the event of getting a head in coin toss, Ac is not getting a head i.e., getting a
tail.

if A is the event of getting an even number in a die roll, Ac is the event of NOT
getting an even number i.e., getting an odd number.

if A is the event of randomly choosing a number in the range of -3 to 3, Ac is the

event of choosing every number that is NOT negative i.e., 0,1,2 & 3 (0 is neither
positive or negative).
 

Consider the following example:

Example: A single coin is tossed 5 times. What is the probability of getting at least
one head?

Solution:

Consider solving this using complement.

Probability of getting no head = P(all tails) = 1/32

P(at least one head) = 1 – P(all tails) = 1 – 1/32 = 31/32.

Sample Probability questions with solutions

Probability Example 1
What is the probability of the occurrence of a number that is odd or less than 5
when a fair die is rolled.

Solution

Let the event of the occurrence of a number that is odd be ‘A’ and the event of the
occurrence of a number that is less than 5 be ‘B’. We need to find P(A or B).

P(A) = 3/6 (odd numbers = 1,3 and 5)

P(B) = 4/6 (numbers less than 5 = 1,2,3 and 4)

P(A and B) = 2/6 (numbers that are both odd and less than 5 = 1 and 3)

Now, P(A or B)            = P(A) + P(B) – P(A or B)

= 3/6 + 4/6 – 2/6

P(A or B) = 5/6.

Probability Example 2
A box contains 4 chocobars and 4 ice creams. Tom eats 3 of them, by randomly
choosing. What is the probability of choosing 2 chocobars and 1 icecream?

Solution

Probability of choosing 1 chocobar = 4/8 = 1/2

After taking out 1 chocobar, the total number is 7.

Probability of choosing 2nd chocobar = 3/7

Probability of choosing 1 icecream out of a total of 6 = 4/6 = 2/3

So the final probability of choosing 2 chocobars and 1 icecream = 1/2 * 3/7 * 2/3 =
1/7

Probability Example 3
When two dice are rolled, find the probability of getting a greater number on the
first die than the one on the second, given that the sum should equal 8.

Solution

Let the event of getting a greater number on the first die be G.

There are 5 ways to get a sum of 8 when two dice are rolled = {(2,6),(3,5),(4,4),
(5,3),(6,2)}.

And there are two ways where the number on the first die is greater than the one
on the second given that the sum should equal 8, G = {(5,3), (6,2)}.

Therefore, P(Sum equals 8) = 5/36 and P(G) = 2/36.

Now, P(G|sum equals 8)         = P(G and sum equals 8)/P(sum equals 8)

= (2/36)/(5/36)

= 2/5

Probability Quiz: Sample probability questions for

practice
 Probability Problem 1

A bag contains blue and red balls. Two balls are drawn randomly without
replacement. The probability of selecting a blue and then a red ball is 0.2.
The probability of selecting a blue ball in the first draw is 0.5. What is the
probability of drawing a red ball, given that the first ball drawn was blue?
a) 0.4
b) 0.2
c) 0.1
d) 0.5

 Answer 1

 Problem 2

 Answer 2

 
Learn how to solve:
– Simple and compound interest problems
– Speed, distance and time problems
– Ratio and proportion
– List of Maths Formulas

Serious about higher education? Join us on social media for regular updates.

   
 MBA Crystal Ball provides professional Admissions Consulting services. Hire us
to improve your chances of getting into the top international universities. Email:
info [at] mbacrystalball [dot] com

First time here? Learn more.

Get a reality check | Knowledgebase | GMAT | GRE | Scholarships | Business Schools
| Career Options | Our Services

MBA Crystal Ball

Our counsellors can help you with career counselling and
//
admissions consulting. Check out our free resources for: GMAT
Preparation & GMAT Syllabus | MBA Subjects | MBA
Scholarships | And much more

35 Comments

algia logan says: Reply

November 20, 2016 at 3:40 am

a number of people gave a hat check girl one hat. suppose all the
tickets got misplaced, so all the hat were given back randomly.
a) if its 2 people determine the probability at least one person got
their hat returned.
b) if its 3 people determine the probability at least one person got
their hat returned.
c) if its 4 people determine the probability at least one person got
their hat returned.
d) if its 5 people determine the probability at least one person got
their hat returned.

Hi I’m Algia and I need help in solving this problem, can you
help me please.

Sam Sam says: Reply

November 12, 2017 at 6:02 pm

a) 1-(0.5)=0.5
b) 1-(0.667*0.5)=0.667
c) 1-(0.75*0.667*0.5)=0.75
d) 1-(0.8*0.75*0.667*0.5)=0.8

Really nice sequence.

P(h’)=1-P(h) etc. At least one hat is correctly returned is

compliment that no hat is returned correctly.

(n-1)/n
 Random says: Reply

February 3, 2018 at 1:58 am

The math here is totally wrong

Sam Sam says: Reply

March 18, 2018 at 9:48 pm

Feel free to enlighten!

abdullah says: Reply

December 5, 2016 at 9:58 pm

Hi
Last question must be 212/216 right ?

Santhosh says: Reply

December 12, 2016 at 7:48 pm

Tell me the way u did that sol. Plzz…

shaily says: Reply

April 25, 2017 at 1:05 pm

yes its must be 212/216

Sangin Pandey says: Reply

November 1, 2017 at 12:21 pm

I think it should be 212/216

Bcz we have 4 number of event to
getting a number of sum less than 5
{(1,1,1),(1,1,2),(1,2,1),(2,1,1)}
It means p(e) = 4/216
Nd getting a number of sum at least 5
Is
1-4/216=212/216

John victor says: Reply

February 23, 2017 at 11:03 am

A woman bought 5basket of tomatos each costing 1250naira,in

her discovery she observe that 90% of the tomatos where
damage resulting to a loss of 510naira.(a)what is the probability
of obtaining an average of 50 if the cost per bag is 50 above the
cost?(b)what will be the actual price for selling the tomato at cost
plus(+) 25%?

ramanan says: Reply

April 26, 2017 at 4:22 pm

the personal director of a company wishes to select applicant for

advanced training without regard to sex. let “W” denotes women
and “M” denotes men and the pattern of arrival be M WWW
MMM WW M WWW MMMM W M W MM WWW MM W MMMM
WW M WW MMMM WW M WWWW MM WW M W WW. will
you conclude that the applicants have arrived in a random
fashion?

haval says: Reply

May 9, 2017 at 12:24 am

pavement.before any 250 m length of a pavement is accepted by

the state highway department,the thickness of a30 m s
mointored by an altrasonic to verify compliance to specification
.each section is rejected if a measurment thickness less than
10cm;otherwise the all section is accepted .from past experment
,the stat highway engineer know the 85%of all section
constructed by the contructor comply with specification .
however the relability of altrusonic thickness testing is only 75
,so that there is a 25 percent chane of errorneous concolusion
based on the determenation of thickness with ultrasonic . what is
the probablity that a poorly constructed section is accepted on
the base of ultrasonic test?

diriba says: Reply

May 26, 2017 at 5:09 pm

solution
the possible out come of rolling die is =6 here in this case since it
is rolled 3 our sample space is 6×6×6=216
we have asked to solve the probability of sum which will be
atleast 5 this means 5 and more is possible. so that we have to
search the possibilities of less than five to easy our work this will
be like[111][112][121] = 3 out comes onlywso p(s`)=3/216 when
p(s`) is probability of sum less than five or probability of sum
greater than equal to five.
since the sum of p(s) and p(s`)=1
p(s)=1-p(s~)
1-3/216=213/216

Sunny says: Reply

 October 14, 2017 at 11:18 pm

what about 2,1,1?

Meychou says: Reply

July 10, 2017 at 8:06 am

Two cards are drawn at random from an ordinary deck of 52

card. Find the probability P that
(a) Both are spade
(b) One is a spade and one is heart

Arjuna says: Reply

August 19, 2017 at 6:52 am

Ans:
(a) Probability of getting spade 1st time is 13/52 and
Probability of getting spade 2nd time is is 12/51
Total Probability is 13*12/(52*51) = 156/2652
(b) Probability of getting spade is 13/52 and Probability
of getting Heart is 12/51
Total probability is 13*13/(52*51) = 169/2652

Olasunkanmi Mayowa says: Reply

August 10, 2017 at 11:58 pm

copying the solution offerred by @ diriba

solution
the possible out come of rolling die is =6 here in this case since it
is rolled 3 our sample space is 6×6×6=216
we have asked to solve the probability of sum which will be
atleast 5 this means 5 and more is possible. so that we have to
search the possibilities of less than five to easy our work this will
be like[111][112][121] = 3 out comes onlywso p(s`)=3/216 when
p(s`) is probability of sum less than five or probability of sum
greater than equal to five.
since the sum of p(s) and p(s`)=1
p(s)=1-p(s~)
1-3/216=213/216

The above solution is good but a little faulty because it

considered only the possibility of obtaining a ‘1’ on the first die,
it omitted the possibility of getting a ‘2’ on the first die i.e (using
the same notation) [211], this is the fourth possible outcome.
Hence P(s)= 1- P(s’)
= 1-4/216
=212/216
=53/54
Hema says: Reply

August 15, 2017 at 5:02 pm

A bag contains blue and red balls. Two balls are drawn randomly
without replacement. The
probability of selecting a blue and then a red ball is 0.2. The
probability of selecting a blue ball in the first
draw is 0.5. What is the probability of drawing a red ball, given
that the first ball drawn was blue? Solution please

Sunny says: Reply

October 14, 2017 at 11:23 pm

Lets assume probability of picking a red ball is X.

The probability of selecting a blue ball and then a red
ball,
P(B)*P(R)=.2
.5*X=.2
x=.5/.2
x=.4

Pururaba swain says: Reply

January 11, 2018 at 3:58 pm

P(R|B)=P(R and B)/P(B)

=0.2/0.5=0.4

Bharath says: Reply

September 5, 2017 at 7:45 am

The personal director of a company wishes to select applicant for

advanced
training without regard to sex. Let ‘W’ denote Women and ‘M’
Denotes men and
the pattern of arrival be M WWW MMM WW M WWW MMMM
W M W MM WWW
MM W MMMM WW M WW MMMM WW M WWWW MM WW M
W M WW. Will
you conclude that the applicants have arrived in a random
fashion?

babar says: Reply

September 6, 2017 at 10:53 pm

The probability of snow tomorrow is 0.6. And the probability

that it will bi colder is 0.7. The probability that it will not snow
and not bi colder is 0.1 .What is probability that it will not snow
if it is colder tomorrow?
please solve it … and tell me answer.. thanks …

kaushik says: Reply

September 18, 2017 at 12:17 pm

in a class 10 boys and 5 girls .three students are selected random

one after the other.find the probability that

1)first two are boys and third is girl

2)first and third is of same gender and third is of opposite gender

please help me in solving this

Lci says: Reply

October 11, 2017 at 11:28 pm

There are three boxes, one of which contains a prize. A

contestant is given two chances, such that if he chooses the
wrong box in the first round, that box is removed from the
selection and he then chooses between the two remaining boxes.
1. What is the probability that the contestant wins?
2. Does the contestant’s probability of winning increases on the
second round?

quark says: Reply

October 24, 2017 at 11:23 pm

Hi Lei,

It’s a Monty Hall problem. You can google it.

As for your question,

As the first box chosen if found empty is removed and
you HAVE/Switch to pick from other two, the P(W) = 2/3.

Above answer can be explained as Prob. of winning on

first box + Prob. of choosing wrong * Prob. of Choosing
right between the two => 1/3+2/3*1/2 => 2/3

The answer to the second: Yes probability increases as

its a 50% chance to win as 1 wrong box is eliminated.

Jesse says: Reply

December 1, 2017 at 2:11 pm

1) 10C2*5C1/15C3?
2) (10C1*5C1*9C1/15C3) + (5C1*10C1*4C1/15C3)?

Rizwan shah says: Reply

November 10, 2017 at 9:28 pm

Plz solve it

XYZ company wants to start a food outlet in pakistan. There is a

40% and 60% chance of stating in hyderabad and karachi
respectively. If he start the outlet in hyderabad there is 30%
chance that it will be in saddar and 70% chance that it will be in
defence area. If they start the outlet in karachi there is 50%
chance that it will be in defence, 30% in clifton and 20% in pechs.
Determine probability of starting the outlet in: (a) saddar (b)
defence area of any city (c) clifton given that the outlet is started
in karachi

Sam Sam says: Reply

November 12, 2017 at 9:02 pm

a) P(H,S) = 40% x 30% =0.4 x 0.3 = 0.12 = 12%

b) P(H, D) + P(K, D) = 40% x 70% + 60% x 50% = 0.4 x 0.7 +
0.6 x 0.5 = 0.28 + 0.3 = 0.58 = 58%
c) P(C|K) = 30%

solomon says: Reply

November 30, 2017 at 7:48 pm

please solve these questions. 1. The probability that a randomly

chosen sales prospect will make a purchase is 0.20. if a sales man
calls an 6 prospects, what is the probability that he will make
……….. a) exactly 4 sales b) 4 or more sales c) no sales

Sam Sam says: Reply

April 8, 2018 at 2:48 pm

a) 15*(0.2)^4*(0.8)^2 = 0.01536
b) 0.01536 + 6*(0.2)^5*(0.8)^1 + 1*(0.2)^6*(0.8)^0 =
0.01696
c) (0.8)^6 = 0.262144

abu almostafa says: Reply

December 15, 2017 at 11:16 pm

please solve this problem : Suppose 100 new born in a maternity

clinic , 55 were females and 45 males . What is the probability of
the next three deliveries are females ?

Pururaba swain says: Reply

January 11, 2018 at 4:12 pm

 In maternity clinic the probability of new born was
females is 55%=0.55

So,the probabilitt of the next three deliveries are females

is 0.55×0.55×0.55=0.166 or 16.6%

Jaime says: Reply

January 26, 2018 at 8:23 am

Pls. Answer. Thanks. Five hundred raffle tickets are sold at P25
each for 3 pieces of P4,000, P250 and P1,000. After each price
drawing, the winner is then returned to the collection of tickets.
What is the expected value if the person purchases four (4)
tickets?

mubashir azeem says: Reply

January 30, 2018 at 10:35 pm

a major urban hospital has gathered data on the number of

heart attack victims seen.the given table indicates the
probabilities of different numbers of heart attack victims being
treated in the emergency room on a typical day number of
victims treated (n)fever than 5 ,6,7,more than 7 p(n)
0.08,0.16,0.30,0.26,0.20

Geoffrey says: Reply

February 23, 2018 at 3:35 pm

I have a question it goes a manufacturing firm produces units of

products in 4 plants A,B,C and D from the first records of
proportion of defectives produced at each brands following
conditional probabilities are set A=0.5 B=1.0,C=0.15, D=0.02 the
first plant produces 30% of the units of the output the 2nd plant
produces 25% the 3rd produces 40% and the 4th 5% .a unit of the
products meant at one of this plants is tested and its found to be
defective. What’s the probability that the units was produced in
plant C.

Sheila M says: Reply

February 26, 2018 at 12:18 am

I am kindly asking for help with the below question

There are three routes from a person,s home to her place of

work.there are four parking lots where she works, three
entrances into her building, two elevators to her floor and one
route from each elevator to her office door.
1. How many ways can she go from her home to her office?
 2. If she makes her various choices at random,what is the
probability that she will take mornungside drive,park in lot
A,use the south entrance and take elevator 1.
3. As she starts her car one morning, she recalls parking lot A
and B are closed for repair.what is the probability that she will
take industrial avenue, park in lot D, use the north entrance and
take elevator 2.

Leave a Reply
Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Comment

Name * Email * Website

Post Comment
Hire Us

Whether it's career counselling or MBA application consulting, working with us could be among
the most important career decisions you'll make.
 Send us an email: info [at] mbacrystalball [dot] com

Copyright © MBA Crystal Ball. All Rights Reserved | Policies      