Find the probability distribution of

number of heads in four tosses of a coin.

Four tosses of a coin. Hence, the sample space of the experiment is S = {HHHH, HHHT, HHTH, HTHH, HTTH, HTHT, HHTT, HTTT, THHH, TTHH, THTH, THHT, THTT, TTHT, TTTH, TTTT}


X represents the number of heads.


As we see, X is a function on sample space whose range is {0, 1, 2, 3, 4}.


Thus, X is a random variable which can take the values 0, 1, 2, 3 or 4.


P(X = 0) = P(TTTT)


P(X = 1) = P(HTTT) + P(TTTH) + P(THTT) + P(TTHT)


P(X = 2) = P(HHTT) + P(THHT) + P(TTHH) + P(THTH) + P(HTHT) + P(HTTH)


P(X = 3) = P(THHH) + P(HHHT) + P(HTHH) + P(HHTH)


P(X = 4) = P(HHHH)


Hence, the required probability distribution is,


X



0



1



2



3



4



P(X)



1/16



1/4



3/8



1/4



1/16



4