A family has two children. What is the probability that both the children are boys given that at least one of them is a boy?
Answer & explanation
Correct answer: option 2
The correct answer is Option (2) → $\frac{1}{3}$ ##
Let $g$ and $b$, respectively denote a girl and a boy.
So, sample space of the experiment is $S = \{(b, b), (g, b), (b, g), (g, g)\} [∴n(S) = 4]$
Let events $E = \text{Both the children are boys}$
$F = \text{At least one of the child is a boy}$
Then $E = \{(b, b)\} \quad [∴n(E) = 1]$
$F = \{(b, b), (g, b), (b, g)\} \quad [∴ n(F) = 3]$
Also, $E \cap F = \{(b, b)\} \quad [∴n(E \cap F) = 1]$
Thus, $P(F) = \frac{n(F)}{n(S)} = \frac{3}{4}$
and $P(E \cap F) = \frac{n(E \cap F)}{n(S)} = \frac{1}{4}$
Therefore,
$P(E | F) = \frac{P(E \cap F)}{P(F)} = \frac{\frac{1}{4}}{\frac{3}{4}} = \frac{1}{3}$