A poll is given, showing 65% are in favor of a new building project.

If 8 people are chosen at random, what is the probability that exactly 7 of them favor the new building project?

1 answer

To solve this problem, we can use the binomial probability formula, which is given by:

\[ P(X = k) = \binom{n}{k} p^k (1-p)^{n-k} \]

where:

  • \( n \) is the number of trials (in this case, 8 people),
  • \( k \) is the number of successes (in this case, 7 people in favor),
  • \( p \) is the probability of success on an individual trial (in this case, 0.65),
  • \( \binom{n}{k} \) is the binomial coefficient, calculated as \( \frac{n!}{k!(n-k)!} \).

Substituting the values into the formula:

  • \( n = 8 \)
  • \( k = 7 \)
  • \( p = 0.65 \)
  1. Calculate the binomial coefficient \( \binom{8}{7} \):

\[ \binom{8}{7} = \frac{8!}{7!(8-7)!} = \frac{8!}{7! \cdot 1!} = \frac{8 \cdot 7!}{7! \cdot 1} = 8 \]

  1. Calculate \( p^k \):

\[ p^7 = (0.65)^7 \]

Calculating \( (0.65)^7 \):

\[ (0.65)^7 \approx 0.04796 \]

  1. Calculate \( (1-p)^{n-k} \):

\[ (1-p)^{8-7} = (0.35)^1 = 0.35 \]

  1. Combine everything into the binomial formula:

Now substitute all of this into the binomial probability formula:

\[ P(X = 7) = \binom{8}{7} (0.65)^7 (0.35)^1 \]

So,

\[ P(X = 7) = 8 \cdot (0.65)^7 \cdot (0.35) \]

Calculating this,

\[ P(X = 7) = 8 \cdot 0.04796 \cdot 0.35 \approx 8 \cdot 0.016786 = 0.134288 \]

Thus, the probability that exactly 7 out of 8 randomly chosen people favor the new building project is approximately:

\[ \boxed{0.1343} \]