Sampling Distributions
and Estimations
Have you ever wondered how the mean, or
average, amount of money per person in a
population is determined? It would be
impossible to contact 100% of the
population,so there must be a
statistical way to estimate the mean
number of peso per person in the
population.
Sampling
Sampling means selecting the group that
you will actually collect data from in
your research.
Random sampling
Is one special type of probability sampling. Random
sampling erases the danger of a researcher consciously
or unconsciously introducing bias when selecting a
sample. In addition, random sampling allows us to use
tools from probability theory that provide the basis for
estimating the characteristics of the population, as well
as for estimating the accuracy of the samples.
Probability theory
is the branch of mathematics that provides
the tools researchers need to make
statistical conclusions about sets of data
based on samples. As previously stated, it
also helps statisticians estimate the
parameters of a population.
Probability theory accomplishes this by
way of the concept of sampling
distributions. A single sample selected
from a population will give an estimate of
the population parameters. Other samples
would give the same, or slightly
different, estimates. Probability theory
helps us understand how to make estimates
of the actual population parameters based
on such samples.
Estimating Population Parameters
from a Small Sample
Suppose you were to randomly select a
sample of only one person from the ten. How
close will this sample be to the population
mean?
The graph below shows the results:
Estimating Population
Parameters
from a Larger Sample
What happens if we take samples of two or more?
First let's look at samples of size two. From a
population of 10, in how many ways can two be
selected if the order of the two does not matter?
Studying a Population through Sampling
Assume you want to study the student population of a
university to determine approval or disapproval of a
student dress code proposed by the administration. The
study's population will be the 18,000 students who attend
the school, and the elements will be the individual
students. A random sample of 100 students will be selected
for the purpose of estimating the opinion of the entire
student body, and attitudes toward the dress code will be
the variable under consideration. For simplicity's sake,
assume that the attitude variable has two variations:
approve and disapprove. As you know from the last chapter,
a scenario such as this in which a variable has two
attributes is called binomial.
The following figure shows the range of possible sample
study results. It presents all possible values of the
parameter in question by representing a range of 0
percent to 100 percent of students approving of the
dress code. The number 50 represents the midpoint, or 50
percent of the students approving of the dress code and
50 percent disapproving. Since the sample size is 100,
at the midpoint, half of the students would be approving
of the dress code, and the other half would be
disapproving.
To randomly select the sample of 100 students, every
student is presented with a number from 1 to 18,000, and
the sample is randomly chosen from a drum containing all
of the numbers. Each member of the sample is then asked
whether he or she approves or disapproves of the dress
code. If this procedure gives 48 students who approve of
the dress code and 52 who disapprove, the result would be
recorded on the figure by placing a dot at 48%. This
statistic is the sample proportion. Let’s assume that
the process was repeated, and it resulted in 52 students
approving of the dress code. Let's also assume that a
third sample of 100 resulted in 51 students approving of
the dress code. The results are shown in the figure
below.
In this figure, the three different sample statistics
representing the percentages of students who approved of the
dress code are shown. The three random samples chosen from the
population give estimates of the parameter that exists for the
entire population. In particular, each of the random samples
gives an estimate of the percentage of students in the total
student body of 18,000 who approve of the dress code. Assume for
simplicity's sake that the true proportion for the population is
50%. This would mean that the estimates are close to the true
proportion.
Sampling Error
Notice that the statistics resulting from the samples
are distributed around the population parameter.
Although there is a wide range of estimates, most of
them lie close to the 50% area of the graph.
Therefore, the true value is likely to be in the
vicinity of 50%. In addition, probability theory
gives a formula for estimating how closely the sample
statistics are clustered around the true value. In
other words, it is possible to estimate the sampling
error, or the degree of error expected for a given
sample design.
The formula
𝑝 - the parameter
𝑛 - the sample size
𝑠 - standard error
The symbols 𝑝 and 1−𝑝 in the formula
represent the population parameters
Calculating Standard Error
If 60 percent of the student body approves of
the dress code and 40% disapproves, p and 1-p
would be 0.6 and 0.4, respectively. The square
root of the product of p and 1-p is the
population standard deviation. As previously
stated, the symbol n represents the number of
cases in each sample, and s is the standard
error.
