Better per match yet worse overall accuracy
Question
Teams A and B played two separate matches. In each match, A's shooting accuracy (goals divided by shots) was higher than B's. Does it follow that A's accuracy over both matches combined was higher than B's? Justify your answer or give a counterexample.
Short answer
No — this is Simpson's paradox. For example, A scores 1 of 100 shots in match 1 while B scores 0 of 1; in match 2 A scores 1 of 1 while B scores 99 of 100. A wins each match on accuracy, but combined A has and B has , because the shot counts weight the matches very differently.
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Open the worked solutionLessons behind this question
- Sample Spaces, Events, and the Probability Axioms
- Independence
- Conditional Probability, Total Probability, and Bayes' Rule
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