Question 6.117

6.117 Computer-assisted career guidance systems.

A wide variety of computer-assisted career guidance systems have been developed over the past decade. These programs use factors such as student interests, aptitude, skills, personality, and family history to recommend a career path. For simplicity, suppose that a program recommends a high school graduate either go to college or join the workforce.

  1. What are the two hypotheses and the two types of error that the program can make?
  2. The program can be adjusted to decrease one error probability at the cost of an increase in the other error probability. Which error probability would you choose to make smaller, and why? (This is a matter of judgment. There is no single correct answer.)

6.117

(a) Hypotheses: “go to college” and “join workforce.” (b) Errors: recommending “go to college” for someone that should “join the workforce” and recommending “join the workforce” for someone that should “go to college.”