randomness (1 Viewer)

[Dumbarse]

what is the best way to divide a bunch of people into groups to assure that the groups are 'random'??

Question from my 2nd year stat exam

 

[Archman]

meh, dunno, get each of them to toss a coin?

 

[Dumbarse]

what if its more than 2 groups they are divided into?

 

[Archman]

u mean into a "random" number of groups?

 

[Dumbarse]

no, any number of groups, say 5 for simplicity
but the people chosen to be in them have to be completley 'randomly' chosen

 

[Archman]

Each person draw 1 from 5 cards.

 

[Dumbarse]

there isnt 5 people¿
what sort of cards?, in what order are they chosen,? how are they chosen?
has to be completely 'random'
dodgy question, the answer comes back to the most basic concept.
theres only like one way u can do it

alright lets say for example 25 people, into 5 groups
divide them so that the groups are completley random

25 pieces of uniform paper with 5 having no. 1, 5 having no. 2...till no.5
place them in a hat mix em up
each person picks out a piece of paper and goes to that group
simple eyy

think about this but, is the order the people take the piece of paper importanmt??

would having a different hat with number 1-25 on it and people picking out of that for the order they pick for the group be more 'random'??

 

[Archman]

well in your case its not that great because it is already set that each groups has 5 people.
what i meant was that each person drawing a card, then return it to the pile and shuffle before letting the next person doing the same. so hence the number of people in each group is also random. well it can be zero of course.

 

[Slidey]

Meh. I don't see how anybody can like stats over pure or even applied maths.

 

[turtle_2468]

Meh. I don't see how anybody can like stats over pure or even applied maths.

yes indeed