A group of ten people consists of four single women, two single men and 2 couples. The ten people are arranged randomly in a circle.
- (i)
Find the probability that the four single women are all separated.
- (ii)
Find the probability that either the four single women are next to one another or the two single men are next to each other but not both.
One of the ten people left the group and the remaining nine decided to sit at a round table with ten identical chairs equally spaced around the table. The chairs are decorated such that every alternate chair is tied with an identical chair sash. Given that the nine people have no preference to which seat to take, find the number of possible seating arrangements.
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Worked solution
7(i)
1. Find the total number of ways to arrange the 10 people in a circle without restrictions.
There are people in total.
Total arrangements in a circle
2. Find the number of ways to arrange the remaining 6 people in a circle.
To ensure the 4 single women are all separated, we must first arrange the other 6 people (2 single men and 4 people from the couples) in a circle.
3. Find the number of ways to arrange the 4 single women into the gaps between the 6 people.
The 6 people seated in a circle create 6 gaps between them. The 4 single women must be placed into 4 of these 6 gaps.
4. Calculate the final probability.
Total favourable arrangements
7(ii)
1. Find the probability that the 4 single women are together.
Let be the event that the single women are together, and be the event that the single men are together.
The total number of unrestricted ways to arrange people in a circle is .
For event , we treat the women as block. Together with the remaining people, this gives entities to arrange in a circle. The women can be arranged internally in ways:
2. Find the probability that the 2 single men are together.
For event , treating the single men as block gives entities to arrange. The men can be arranged internally in ways:
3. Find the probability that both groups are together.
For the intersection , we treat the single women as block and the single men as block. Along with the remaining people (from the couples), this gives entities. Both blocks have their own internal arrangements:
4. Calculate the probability that exactly one of the events occurs (either A or B, but not both).
The probability that exactly one of these events occurs is given by the symmetric difference:
7[2]
1. Determine the number of distinct relative positions for the empty chair.
With 10 chairs arranged in an alternating pattern of sashes (S, N, S, N, ...), there is a 5-fold rotational symmetry for the table.
The single empty chair can be chosen in exactly distinct ways that cannot be mapped to each other by rotation: either it is a chair with a sash, or a chair without a sash.
2. Calculate the total number of seating arrangements for the 9 people.
Once the type of the empty chair is fixed, the rotational symmetry is broken and the remaining 9 chairs become distinct linear positions.
The 9 distinct people can be seated in these 9 chairs in ways.
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