Practice Questions: Probability

1. Three dice are thrown at the same time. Find the probability of getting three two’s if it is known
that the sum of numbers on the dice was six.
2. A couple has two children. B represents a boy and G represents a girl. Based on the above
information, answer the following questions:
(i) What is the probability that both the children are boys if it is known that the elder child is
boy?
(ii) What is the probability that both the children are girls if it is known that the elder child is
girl?
(iii) What is the probability that both the children are boys if it is known that at least one of
them is boy?
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3. The probabilities of A and B solving a problem independently are and respectively. If both try
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to solve the problem independently, what is the probability that the problem is solved?
4. A and B throw a die alternately till one of them gets a 6 and wins the game. Find their respective
probabilities of winning, if A starts the game first.
5. A, B and C shot to hit a target. If A hits the target 4 times in 5 trials, B hits it 3 times in 4 trials
and C hits 2 times in 3 trials; what is the probability that the target is hit by at least 2 persons?
6. Bag I contains 3 red and 4 black balls, Bag II contains 5 red and 2 black balls. Two balls are
transferred at random from Bag I to Bag II and then a ball is drawn at random from Bag II. Find
the probability that the drawn ball is red in colour.
7. Suppose that the reliability of a HIV test is specified as follows:
Of people having HIV, 90 % of the test detect the disease but 10% go undetected. Of people free
of HIV, 99% of the test are judged HIV-ive but 1% are diagnosed as showing HIV +ive. From a
large population of which only 0.1% have HIV, one person is selected at random, given the HIV
test, and the pathologist reports him/her as HIV +ive. What is the probability that the person
actually has HIV?
8. By examining the chest X-ray, the probability that TB is detected when a person is actually
suffering from it is 0.99. The probability of an healthy person diagnosed to have TB is 0.001. In a
certain city, 1 in 1000 people suffers from TB. A person is selected at random and is diagnosed to
have TB. What is the probability that he/she actually has TB?
9. An insurance company believes that people can be divided into two classes: those who are
accident prone and those who are not. The company’s statistics show that an accident- prone
person will have an accident at sometime within a fixed one-year period with probability 0.6,
whereas this probability is 0.2 for a person who is not accident prone. The company knows that 20
percent of the population is accident prone.
Based on the above information, answer the following questions:
(i) What is the probability that a new policyholder will have an accident within a year of
purchasing a policy?
(ii) Suppose that a new policyholder has an accident within a year of purchasing a policy.
What is the probability that he or she is accident prone?
10. Two cards are drawn successively with replacement from a well shuffled pack of 52 cards. Find
the probability distribution of the number of spade cards.
11. Let X be a random variable which assumes values 𝑥1 , 𝑥2 , 𝑥3 , 𝑥4 such that
2𝑃(𝑋 = 𝑥1 ) = 3𝑃(𝑋 = 𝑥2 ) = 𝑃(𝑋 = 𝑥3 ) = 5𝑃(𝑋 = 𝑥4 ). Find the probability distribution of X.
12. Three numbers are selected at random (without replacement) from first six positive integers. If X
denotes the smallest of the three numbers obtained, find the probability distribution of X. Also
find the mean of the distribution.
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13. A biased die is such that 𝑃(4) = 10 and other scores being equally likely. The die is tossed twice.
If X is the ‘number of 4’s seen’, find the mean of the random variable X.
14. Find the probability distribution of the maximum of the two scores obtained when a die is thrown
twice. Also determine the mean of the distribution.
15. There are 5 cards numbered 1 to 5, one number on one card. Two cards are drawn at random
without replacement. Let X denote the sum of the numbers on two cards drawn. Find E(X).
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