Chapter four

Sampling and Sampling

Distribution
 Definitions of Some Basic Terms in Sampling
o Population: is the complete set of possible measurements for which
inferences are to be made. Population represents the target of an
investigation, and the objective of the investigation is to draw
conclusions about the population.
o Census: a complete enumeration of the population. But in most real
problems it cannot be realized, hence we take sample.
o Sample: Elements taken from the population under consideration.
o Sample survey: A study that asks questions of a sample drawn from
some population.
o Parameter: Characteristic or measured value obtained from a
population.
o Statistic: Characteristic or measure value obtained from a sample.
 Con.
o Sampling: is the process of selecting a subset of individuals
or items from a larger population to make inferences about the
population as a whole.
o To draw valid conclusions from your results, you have to
carefully decide how you will select a sample that is
representative of the group as a whole.
o The selection of a sampling method depends on several factors
such as the research objective, the size of the population, the
resources available, and the level of precision required.
 Con.
o Sampling unit: An element or a group of elements on which
observations can be taken during sampling is called a
sampling unit.
o Examples:
 If somebody studies the Scio-economic status of the
households, households are the sampling unit.
 If one studies performance of freshman students in some
college, the student is the sampling unit.
o Sampling frame: is the list of all elements in a population.
 List of households.
 List of students in the registrar office.
o Errors in sample survey: When we take a sample, our results
will not exactly equal the results for the whole population. That
is, our results will be subject to errors.

There are two types of errors

A. Sampling errors: is the error that results from using the
sample to estimate information regarding the population.
o It is the discrepancy between sample statistic and population
parameter.
o This may arise due to inappropriate sampling techniques applied.
o Sampling error can be minimized by increasing the size of
sample.
 Con.
B. Non-sampling errors: are errors that result from the survey
process or due to procedure bias such as:
 The methods of interview and observation collection may be
inaccurate or inappropriate.
 The questionnaire, definitions, and instructions may be
ambiguous.
 The investigators may be inexperienced or not trained properly.
 Mistake in coding into standard classification.

 We can eliminate or reduce non-sampling error by carefully design

of the sampling procedure & not by increasing the sample size.
Con.
Advantages of sampling over complete enumeration:
 Reduced cost

 Greater speed(Urgent information required)

 Greater accuracy

 Organization of work or increase the feasibility of study

 More detailed information can be obtained.

 Sampling Technique
The technique of selecting a sample is important in sampling and
usually, it depends upon the nature of the investigation.
o There are two types of sampling.
1. Random Sampling or probability sampling.
o Probability sampling is a technique in which every unit in the
population has a chance of being selected in the sample, and
this chance can be accurately determined.
 Simple random sampling
 Stratified random sampling

 Cluster sampling

 Systematic sampling

12/13/2024 By habtamu.A.
 Simple Random Sampling
o It is a method of selecting items from a population such that every
possible sample of a specific size has an equal chance of being
selected. In this case, the sample can be drawn in two possible
ways.
o The sampling units are chosen without replacement in the sense
that the unit once chosen are not placed back in the population.
o The sampling units are chosen with replacement in the sense that
the chosen units are placed back in the population.
o Simple random sampling involves randomly selecting respondents
from a sampling frame, but with large sampling frames, usually a
table of random numbers or a computerized random number
generator is used.
 Stratified Random Sampling
o When the population is heterogeneous concerning the study variable it
would not be desirable to use simple random sampling. In such cases,
stratified random sampling would be appropriate.
o The population is first divided into homogenous groups called strata
and a simple random sample is then taken from each strata.
o Elements in the same strata should be more or less homogeneous while
different in different strata.
o The number of units to be selected from each stratum can be determined
by one of the following allocation methods.
o Proportional allocation: If the same sampling fraction is used for each
stratum. Some of the criteria for dividing a population into strata are:
Sex (male, female); Age (under 18, 18 to 28, and 29 to 39).
Con.
Example: To find the average height of the students in a school
of class 1 to class 12, the height varies a lot as the students in
class 1 are of age around 6 years and students in class 10 are of
age around 16 years. So one can divide all the students into
different subpopulations or strata such as
 Students of class 1, 2, and 3: Stratum 1
 Students of class 4, 5, and 6: Stratum 2
 Students of class 7, 8, and 9: Stratum 3
 Students of class 10, 11, and 12: Stratum 4
o Now draw the samples by SRS from each of the strata 1, 2, 3,
and 4. All the drawn samples combined will constitute the final
stratified sample for further analysis.
 Cluster Sampling
o If you have a population dispersed over a wide geographic
region, it may not be feasible to conduct a simple random
sampling of the entire population. In such case, it may be
reasonable to divide the population into clusters (usually
along geographic boundaries).
o A simple random sample of groups or clusters of elements is
chosen and all the sampling units in the selected clusters will
be surveyed.
o Clusters are formed in a way that elements within a cluster
are heterogeneous, i.e. observations in each cluster should be
more or less dissimilar.
o Cluster sampling is useful when it is difficult or costly to
generate a simple random sample.
Con.
o In cluster sampling, we follow the following steps:
1. Divide the population into clusters (usually along
geographic boundaries).
2. Randomly sample clusters.
3. Measure all units within sampled clusters
o Cluster sampling is preferred when
1. No reliable listing of elements is available and it is
expensive to prepare it.
2. Even if the list of elements is available, the location or
identification of the units may be difficult.
 Con.
o For example, to estimate the average annual household
income in a large city we use cluster sampling because to use
simple random sampling we need a complete list of households
in the city from which to sample.
o To use stratified random sampling, we would again need the
list of households. A less expensive way is to let each block
within the city represent a cluster.
o A sample of clusters could then be randomly selected, and
every household within these clusters could be interviewed to
find the average annual household income.
 Systematic Sampling
o In this technique, the sampling frame is ordered according to some

criteria, and elements are selected at regular intervals through that

ordered list. A complete list of all elements within the population
(sampling frame) is required.
o The procedure starts with determining the first element to be

included in the sample.

o Then the technique is to take the kth item from the sampling frame.

Where;
Con.
o Choice any number between 1 to . Suppose it is
o The unit is selected at first and then Until the required sample is

reached.

Example: Let N = 50 and n = 5. So k =10. Suppose first selected

number between 1 and 10 is 3. Then systematic sample consists of
units with the following serial number 3, 13, 23, 33, 43.
2. Non-random sampling or non-probability sampling

o It is the sampling technique in which some units of the

population have zero chance of selection or the probability of
selection cannot be accurately determined.
o Typically, sample are selected based on personal judgment or

other than random chance, such as quota, convenience, personal

choice, or interest of the researcher.
o Non-probability sampling does not allow the estimation of
sampling errors and may be subjected to a sampling bias.
Con.
o There are different type of non-random sampling method
among those.
 Judgment sampling.
 Convenience sampling
 Quota Sampling.
 Judgment Sampling
o In this case, the person taking the sample has direct or
indirect control over which items are selected for the sample.
It is subjective and can be influenced by researcher bias.
o This approach is used when a sample is taken based on
certain judgments about the overall population.
o Example: Consider a marketing expert analyzing consumer
preferences for a new product. using their expertise, they
select specific focus groups based on age, income, and
shopping behavior.
 Convenience Sampling

o In this method, the decision maker select participants based on

their accessibility and availability to the researcher. Rather than
being drawn at random from a bigger population, participants in
this strategy are picked because they are easily available to the
researcher.
o For example: television reporters often look for people on the
street interviewers’ to find out how people view an issue.
o The researcher selects participants in street shopping to know the
satisfaction of customers and the service quality of the new
product or service.
 Quota sampling

o The population is divided into mutually exclusive subgroups

(just as in stratified sampling), and then a non-random set of
observations is chosen from each subgroup to meet a
predefined quota.
o In this method, the decision maker requires the sample to
contain a certain number of items with a given characteristic.
o Example 1: Suppose a cigarette company wants to find out
what age group prefers what brand of cigarettes in a particular
city. They apply survey quota to the age groups of 21–30, 31–
40, 41–50, and 51+.
o Many political polls are, in part, quota-sampling.
 Sampling distribution
o Given a variable , if we arrange its values in ascending order
and assign probability to each of the values or if we present in
the form of relative frequency distribution the result is called
Sampling Distribution of X.
o The association between probability and data is formed by the
sampling distributions of statistics.
o Note that different samples could yield different values for X.
o Example: Suppose you sample 50 students from your college
regarding their mean GPA. if you obtained many different
samples of 50 students, you will compute the different mean
for each sample.
Sampling Distribution of the sample mean

o A statistic, such as sample mean, sample proportion sample

standard deviation, is a number computed from the sample. Since
a sample is random, every statistic is random variable: it varies
from sample to sample in a way that cannot be predicted with
certainty.
o A sampling distribution is simply a type of probability
distribution. Unlike the distributions studied so far, a sampling
distribution refers not to individual observations but to the values
of statistic computed from those observations, in sample after
sample.
o A sampling distribution shows how a statistic would vary in
repeated data production.
Con.
o Definition: A sampling distribution is a probability distribution
that determines probabilities of the possible values of a sample
statistic.
o The probability distribution of statistic(sample mean) is called
sampling distribution .
Con.

o Steps for the construction of sampling distribution of the

mean.
 From a finite population of size, randomly draw all possible

samples of size, .
 Calculate the mean for each sample.

 Summarize the mean obtained in step 2 in terms of

frequency distribution or relative frequency distribution.

Con.
o Example: Suppose we have a population of size, consisting of
the age of five children: 6, 8, 10, 12, and 14.
 Population mean =
 Population variance = .

o Take samples of size 2 with replacement and construct a

sampling distribution of the sample mean.
o Solution : = 5 and =2. We have possible samples since
sampling is with replacement.
 Con.
o Step 1: Draw all possible sample sizes:

6 8 10 12 14

6 (6, 6) (6, 8) (6, 10) (6, 12) (6, 14)

8 (8,6) (8,8) (8,10) (8,12) (8,14)

10 (10,6) (10,8) (10,10) (10,12) (10,14)

12 (12,6) (12,8) (12,10) (12,12) (12,14)

14 (12,6) (14,8) (12,10) (12,12) (12,14)

 Con.
o Step 2: Calculate the mean for each sample:

6 8 10 12 14

6 6 7 8 9 10

8 7 8 9 10 11

10 8 9 10 11 12

12 9 10 11 12 13

14 10 11 12 13 14
Con.
o Step 3: Summarize the mean obtained in step 2 in terms of
frequency distribution.

6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14
freq. 1 2 3 4 5 4 3 2 1
Con.
a. Find the mean of , say

b. Find variance of

12/13/2024 By habtamu.A.
Con.
o Exercise: a rolling team consists of four rowers who weigh

152, 156, 160, and 164 pounds.

 Find all possible samples with replacement two.

 Compute the sample mean for each one.

 Find the probability distribution, the mean, and the standard

deviation of the sample mean.

Con.
o Remark:
1. In general if the sampling is without replacement.

2. If sampling is without replacement

3. In any case the sample mean is unbiased estimator of the

population mean. i.e.
(show!)
Con.
o Sampling may be from a normally distributed population or a

non-normally distributed population.

o When sampling is from a normally distributed population, the

distribution of will possess the following property.

a. The distribution of , will be normal
b. The mean of is equal to the population mean
c. The variance of is equal to the population variance divided
by the sample size,
 Central Limit Theorem
o The central limit theorem states that, Given a population of any

functional form with mean and variance , then the distribution of

tends to the normal distribution 𝒩(𝜇, ) as 𝑛 → ∞ , Equivalently,
tends in distribution to the standard normal distribution .
Con.

o In conclusion, The central limit theorem states that if you take

sufficiently large samples from a population, the sample mean

will be normally distributed, even if the population isn’t
normally distributed.

a. The sample size is sufficiently large.

b. The samples are independent and identically distributed(iid).

c. The population’s distribution has finite variance.