Business Case Studies & Business Publications

The Pelayo Family Plays Roulette: The Pr...

Pfeifer, Phillip E...

Case

The Pelayo Family Plays Roulette: The Prequel

Pfeifer, Phillip E.; Bodily, Samuel E.; Baucells, Manel

QA-0847 | Published June 20, 2016 | 1 pages Case

Collection: Darden School of Business

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The case presents data from 70,340 spins of four roulette wheels: three of which are real ("imperfect") and one of which is simulated ("perfect"). The challenge posed is to identify which of the four is the simulated wheel. After weeks spent recording spin results at their local casino, the members of the Pelayo family think they have identified three imperfect wheels. Before they start betting, they want to be certain that the three wheels they identified as imperfect are easily distinguishable from a theoretically perfect wheel. This case has been used successfully in Darden’s MBA elective about data analysis. That course introduced pivot tables and the chi-squared goodness-of-fit test using the case “The Roulette Wheel” (UVA-QA-0718). Discussion of the “The Pelayo Family Plays Roulette” probably will not require an entire class period. One option would be to hand out this case during the discussion of “The Roulette Wheel” as something of a follow-on.