Notes: 61.23 The skewness of the binomial distribution

Extract

Many results in A level statistics textbooks are quoted with the observation that the proof is “outside the scope of this book”. The result discussed here, which many students find surprising when they meet it for the first time, is obtained by a method which requires only some knowledge of moments and of the use of a probability generating function in the calculation of the mean and variance. It may be found by the students themselves with a little prompting.