Question

Which of the following is a good example of a representative sample?

To get an idea about American views on immigration, you poll random individuals at the Republican National Convention.

An anonymous survey is provided to all sophomores to learn more about cheating amongst high school students.

You use a computer program to randomly dial numbers in the phone book to respond to your poll about phone services.

You request that a local Baptist church distribute your survey investigating American family values.

Answer 1

Well the first one is not a good representative sample because the Republican National Convention members are not a good representation of Americans as a whole and therefore would not give you an accurate representation of American views on immigration.

Answer 2

The second one will only tell you what sophomores think/do/perceive about cheating, not high school students as a whole. So polling sophomores would not be a good representation of the high school population.

Answer 3

And the last one is also not a good representation of American family values, because not all Americans are Baptists

Answer 4

Therefore, the random phone survey is your answer. Because it is looking to survey phone users and it randomly dials only phone users, you will get a random sample of phone users that is representative of your target population.