 Solution

A $100(1-\alpha )\%$ confidence interval procedure produces random endpoints $L,U$ such that ${\mathbb{P}}_{\mu }(L\le \mu \le U)=1-\alpha$, under the model. In everyday terms, repeating the same sampling and interval construction many times would give intervals containing the true mean in about $100(1-\alpha )\%$ of repetitions.

For $n\ge 2$, define the sample mean $\bar{X}=n^{-1}{\sum }_i{X}_i$ and the sample variance $S^2=(n-1{)}^{-1}{\sum }_i(X_i-\bar{X}{)}^2$. For independent observations from a normal distribution with ${\sigma }^2>0$, the standard sampling results areThe first follows from the independent normal sample mean and sample variance. Let $q=t_{n-1,1-\alpha /2}$ be the positive Student quantile. Symmetry gives the central confidence intervalIts width is $W=2qS/\sqrt{n}$, so