A student is certain of the answers to 4 questions but is totally baffled by 6 questions. If the student randomly guesses the answers to those 6 questions, what is the probability that the student will get a score of 5 or more on the test? E

The multiple choice test has 10 questions and each question has 5 possible answers.

1 Answer
Apr 20, 2017

#11529/15625~~73.79%#

Explanation:

Let us assume that the student gets the #4# questions which he is certain of correctly.

Now, he randomly guesses the remaining #6# questions, which each have #5# options. The probability of him getting a particular problem correctly is #1/5#.

In order to score a #5# or more, he needs to get at least #1# of the remaining #6# questions correctly. We can find the probability that he gets exactly #1# question correct, #2# questions correct, #3# questions correct, …, and #6# questions correct. Adding these probabilities will give us the correct answer.

But there is an easier way. We can calculate the probability that he will not get a score of #5# or more and subtract it from #1#. In other words, we calculate #1-P("all remaining 6 questions wrong")#.

Assuming that answering the remaining six questions are independent events, we can just multiply the probabilities of getting one question wrong: #1-4/5*4/5*4/5*4/5*4/5*4/5=11529/15625~~73.79%#.