• 100 questions

Principles of Statistics DSST Practice Test

Unofficial practice on the five equal areas of the DSST Principles of Statistics outline, with every answer worked.

What is the sample standard deviation of 2, 4, 6, 8 and 10?

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Unofficial practice questions, not affiliated with Prometric, which owns the DSST program. Bank checked October 8, 2026.

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All 100 questions

Foundations of statistics 20

  • A city wants to show how its monthly rainfall changed over two years. Which graph fits best? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Line Graphs". DSST outline area I, d. visual representation of data (line graphs)
  • A clinic records each donor's blood type: A, B, AB or O. Which level of measurement is this? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Levels of Measurement". DSST outline area I, a. data types and levels of measurement
  • A data set has Q1 = 20 and Q3 = 30. By the 1.5 × IQR rule, which value is an outlier? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: I. Foundations of Statistics (20% of the exam), c. descriptive statistics (measures of position: outliers)
  • A district picks 5 of its 60 classrooms at random and surveys every student in those 5 rooms. What kind of sample is this? Statistics Canada, Statistics: Power from Data!, "Probability sampling". DSST outline area I, b. sampling
  • A pollster questions 400 of a city's 90,000 registered voters. What is the population in this study? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Inferential Statistics". DSST outline area I, a. sample vs. population
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Foundations of statistics, continued

  • A school splits its students into four grade levels and draws a random sample from each grade. What kind of sample is this? Statistics Canada, Statistics: Power from Data!, "Probability sampling". DSST outline area I, b. sampling
  • A store surveys every 20th customer who enters, after a random start among the first 20. What kind of sample is this? Statistics Canada, Statistics: Power from Data!, "Probability sampling". DSST outline area I, b. sampling
  • A TV show asks viewers to phone in their opinion on a new law. What is the main weakness of the result? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Sampling Bias". DSST outline area I, b. sampling (bias)
  • Five homes sold for 3, 5, 6, 8 and 48 hundred thousand dollars. Which measure best describes a typical sale, and why? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: I. Foundations of Statistics (20% of the exam), c. descriptive statistics (measures of central tendency)
  • For the data 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13, 15, take Q1 as the median of the lower half and Q3 as the median of the upper half. What is the interquartile range? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: I. Foundations of Statistics (20% of the exam), c. descriptive statistics (measures of position: IQR)
  • In a box plot, what does the line drawn inside the box mark? NIST/SEMATECH e-Handbook of Statistical Methods, section 1.3.3.7, "Box Plot". DSST outline area I, d. visual representation of data (box plots)
  • In a distribution with a long tail to the right (positive skew), how do the mean and the median usually compare? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Comparing Measures of Central Tendency". DSST outline area I, c. descriptive statistics (shape of distribution)
  • In a stem-and-leaf plot of test scores, one row reads 4 | 2 5 7, where the stem is the tens digit. Which scores does the row show? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: I. Foundations of Statistics (20% of the exam), d. visual representation of data (stem and leaf)
  • The mean age of all 50 employees of a company is 41. The mean age of 10 of them picked at random is 39. Which statement is correct? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Introduction to Estimation". DSST outline area I, a. sample vs. population
  • Researchers randomly assign 60 volunteers to take a new drug or a placebo, then compare blood pressure. What makes this an experiment and not an observational study? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Inferential Statistics". DSST outline area I, b. sampling (research design)
  • Runners are recorded as finishing first, second, third and so on. Which level of measurement is this? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Levels of Measurement". DSST outline area I, a. data types and levels of measurement
  • Temperature in degrees Fahrenheit is measured at which level? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Levels of Measurement". DSST outline area I, a. data types and levels of measurement
  • What is the sample standard deviation of 2, 4, 6, 8 and 10? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: I. Foundations of Statistics (20% of the exam), c. descriptive statistics (measures of dispersion)
  • Which graph shows the distribution of a quantitative variable, such as commuting time, by counting the values that fall in each interval? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Histograms". DSST outline area I, d. visual representation of data
  • Why is weight in kilograms a ratio-level measurement? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Levels of Measurement". DSST outline area I, a. data types and levels of measurement

Probability 20

  • A batter gets a hit in 28% of at-bats. What is the probability that the batter does not get a hit in a given at-bat? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: II. Probability (20% of the exam), a. basic concepts of probability (event)
  • A box holds 3 defective fuses and 9 good ones. Two fuses are taken out, one after the other, and not put back. What is the probability that both are defective? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: II. Probability (20% of the exam), b. probability rules for dependent events
  • A bus arrives at a time that is uniformly distributed between 0 and 10 minutes from now. What is the probability that it arrives between 2 and 5 minutes from now? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: II. Probability (20% of the exam), e. continuous distributions (uniform)
  • A coin is tossed three times and the result of each toss is recorded in order. How many outcomes are in the sample space? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: II. Probability (20% of the exam), a. basic concepts of probability (sample space)
  • A factory tests 600 light bulbs and finds 18 defective. What is the relative frequency of a defective bulb? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: II. Probability (20% of the exam), a. basic concepts of probability (relative frequency)
  • A fair coin is tossed 5 times. What is the probability of exactly 2 heads? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: II. Probability (20% of the exam), d. discrete distributions (binomial)
  • A fair coin is tossed more and more times. What does the law of large numbers say about the proportion of heads? Wolfram MathWorld, "Weak Law of Large Numbers". DSST outline area II, a. basic concepts of probability (the law of large numbers)
  • A variable is normally distributed with mean 50. What is the probability that a value is greater than 50? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Introduction to Normal Distributions". DSST outline area II, e. continuous distributions (normal)
  • Calls reach a help desk at a mean rate of 4 an hour and follow a Poisson distribution. What is the variance of the number of calls in an hour? NIST/SEMATECH e-Handbook of Statistical Methods, section 1.3.6.6.19, "Poisson Distribution". DSST outline area II, d. discrete distributions (poisson)
  • Each call a salesperson makes ends in a sale with probability 0.2, independently of the others. What is the probability that the first sale comes on the third call? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: II. Probability (20% of the exam), d. discrete distributions (geometric)
  • Events A and B are independent, with P(A) = 0.4 and P(B) = 0.25. What is P(A and B)? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: II. Probability (20% of the exam), b. probability rules for independent events (multiplication)
  • In how many ways can 3 books be chosen from 8 different books when the order does not matter? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: II. Probability (20% of the exam), c. combinations and permutations
  • IQ scores are normal with mean 100 and standard deviation 15. About what percent of scores lie between 70 and 130? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Areas Under Normal Distributions". DSST outline area II, e. continuous distributions (normal)
  • P(A) = 0.3 and P(A and B) = 0.12. What is P(B given A)? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: II. Probability (20% of the exam), b. probability rules (conditional probability)
  • P(A) = 0.5, P(B) = 0.3 and P(A and B) = 0.1. What is P(A or B)? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: II. Probability (20% of the exam), b. probability rules (addition)
  • Six runners enter a race. In how many ways can first, second and third place be filled? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: II. Probability (20% of the exam), c. combinations and permutations
  • Which equation shows that events A and B are independent? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Basic Concepts" of probability. DSST outline area II, b. probability rules for dependent and independent events
  • Which of these is counted with combinations and not permutations? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: II. Probability (20% of the exam), c. combinations and permutations
  • X is binomial with n = 100 trials and success probability p = 0.2. What are its mean and standard deviation? NIST/SEMATECH e-Handbook of Statistical Methods, section 1.3.6.6.18, "Binomial Distribution". DSST outline area II, d. discrete distributions (binomial)
  • X takes the values 0, 1, 2 and 3 with probabilities 0.1, 0.3, 0.4 and 0.2. What is the expected value of X? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: II. Probability (20% of the exam), d. discrete distributions (expected values)

Correlation and regression 20

  • A least-squares line has slope 2. The mean of x is 10 and the mean of y is 50. What is the y-intercept? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Introduction to Linear Regression". DSST outline area III, c. linear regression (y-intercept)
  • A line was fitted to data on children aged 2 to 10 and predicts height from age. Why should it not be used to predict the height of a 30-year-old? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: III. Correlation and Regression (20% of the exam), d. prediction using the linear model
  • A regression line has a negative slope and a coefficient of determination of 0.81. What is r? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: III. Correlation and Regression (20% of the exam), c. linear regression (coefficient of determination)
  • A regression line predicts a score of 78 for a student who actually scores 82. What is the residual? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: III. Correlation and Regression (20% of the exam), c. linear regression (residuals)
  • A regression line predicts an exam score from hours studied: ŷ = 30 + 5x. What does the slope mean? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: III. Correlation and Regression (20% of the exam), c. linear regression (slope)
  • A study uses hours of sleep to predict reaction time. Which variable goes on the horizontal axis of the scatter plot? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Introduction to Linear Regression". DSST outline area III, a. scatter plots
  • All the points of a scatter plot lie exactly on a line that slopes downward. What is r? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: III. Correlation and Regression (20% of the exam), b. linear correlation (strength and direction)
  • The correlation between x and y is r = 0.8. What share of the variation in y does the regression on x explain? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Partitioning the Sums of Squares". DSST outline area III, c. linear regression (coefficient of determination)
  • For a set of data, r = 0.6, the standard deviation of x is 4 and the standard deviation of y is 10. What is the slope of the least-squares line? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Introduction to Linear Regression". DSST outline area III, c. linear regression (slope)
  • For the regression line ŷ = 30 + 5x, where x is hours studied, what does the 30 stand for? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: III. Correlation and Regression (20% of the exam), c. linear regression (y-intercept)
  • Four studies report correlations of 0.61, −0.88, 0.35 and −0.07 between two variables. In which study is the linear relationship strongest? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: III. Correlation and Regression (20% of the exam), b. linear correlation (strength and direction)
  • Heights are changed from inches to centimeters and the correlation with weight is computed again. What happens to r? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Properties of Pearson's r". DSST outline area III, b. linear correlation
  • The line ŷ = 12.5 + 0.8x predicts weekly sales (in thousands of dollars) from advertising minutes x. What does it predict for 40 minutes? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: III. Correlation and Regression (20% of the exam), d. prediction using the linear model
  • The line ŷ = 200 − 4x predicts the number of units sold at a price of x dollars. At what price does it predict sales of 120 units? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: III. Correlation and Regression (20% of the exam), d. prediction using the linear model
  • On a scatter plot of price against miles driven for used cars, the points fall from the upper left to the lower right. What does this show? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: III. Correlation and Regression (20% of the exam), a. scatter plots
  • Towns with more ice cream sales also have more drownings. Why does this correlation not show that ice cream causes drowning? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Causation". DSST outline area III, b. linear correlation
  • Two variables have r = 0. What can be concluded? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Properties of Pearson's r". DSST outline area III, b. linear correlation (strength and direction)
  • What does a scatter plot display? NIST/SEMATECH e-Handbook of Statistical Methods, section 1.3.3.26, "Scatter Plot". DSST outline area III, a. scatter plots
  • What does the least-squares regression line make as small as possible? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Introduction to Linear Regression". DSST outline area III, c. linear regression (line of best fit)
  • Which value cannot be a Pearson correlation coefficient? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Properties of Pearson's r". DSST outline area III, b. linear correlation (strength and direction)

Sampling distributions 20

  • A fair coin is tossed 100 times. Which normal distribution approximates the number of heads? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Normal Approximation to the Binomial". DSST outline area IV, b. sampling distributions, normal approximation
  • A normal population has mean 50 and standard deviation 8. About what share of the means of random samples of 16 fall between 48 and 52? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: IV. Sampling Distributions (20% of the exam), b. sampling distributions of a mean, normal approximation
  • A population has mean 60 and standard deviation 12. By the central limit theorem, the means of random samples of 144 are approximately normal with which mean and standard error? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: IV. Sampling Distributions (20% of the exam), c. central limit theorem
  • A population has mean 80. Random samples of size 25 are drawn again and again. The sampling distribution of the sample mean has what mean? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Sampling Distribution of the Mean". DSST outline area IV, b. sampling distributions of a mean
  • A population has standard deviation 12. What is the standard error of the mean for random samples of size 36? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Sampling Distribution of the Mean". DSST outline area IV, b. sampling distributions of a mean, standard error
  • A population has standard deviation 20. How large a sample gives a standard error of the mean of 2? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: IV. Sampling Distributions (20% of the exam), b. sampling distributions of a mean, standard error
  • A population is normal with mean 50 and standard deviation 10. What is the probability that the mean of a random sample of 25 is greater than 52? NIST/SEMATECH e-Handbook of Statistical Methods, section 1.3.6.7.1, "Cumulative Distribution Function of the Standard Normal Distribution". DSST outline area IV, b. sampling distributions of a mean, normal approximation
  • A test has mean 74 and standard deviation 8. What is the z score of a score of 86? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: IV. Sampling Distributions (20% of the exam), a. standard scores such as z scores
  • Ana scores 80 on test A (mean 70, standard deviation 5) and 85 on test B (mean 75, standard deviation 10). On which test did she do better compared with the other test takers? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: IV. Sampling Distributions (20% of the exam), a. standard scores such as z scores
  • Between which two z scores does the middle 95% of a standard normal distribution lie? NIST/SEMATECH e-Handbook of Statistical Methods, section 1.3.6.7.1, "Cumulative Distribution Function of the Standard Normal Distribution". DSST outline area IV, a. standard scores such as z scores
  • Heights are normal with mean 64 inches and standard deviation 2.5 inches. What is the probability that a height is less than 69 inches? NIST/SEMATECH e-Handbook of Statistical Methods, section 1.3.6.7.1, "Cumulative Distribution Function of the Standard Normal Distribution". DSST outline area IV, a. standard scores such as z scores
  • How does the spread of the sampling distribution of the mean compare with the spread of the population, for samples of more than one value? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Sampling Distribution of the Mean". DSST outline area IV, c. central limit theorem
  • In a normal distribution, what is the percentile rank of a value with z = 0? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: IV. Sampling Distributions (20% of the exam), a. standard scores such as z scores
  • Incomes in a city are strongly skewed to the right. What is the shape of the sampling distribution of the mean income for random samples of 200 people? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Sampling Distribution of the Mean". DSST outline area IV, c. central limit theorem
  • The sample size is raised from 25 to 100. How does the mean's standard error change? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: IV. Sampling Distributions (20% of the exam), b. sampling distributions of a mean, standard error
  • Scores are normal with mean 100 and standard deviation 15. The z score that cuts off the top 10% is 1.28. What score is needed to be in the top 10%? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: IV. Sampling Distributions (20% of the exam), a. standard scores such as z scores
  • Scores have mean 500 and standard deviation 100. Which score has z = −1.2? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: IV. Sampling Distributions (20% of the exam), a. standard scores such as z scores
  • What does the central limit theorem say? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Sampling Distribution of the Mean". DSST outline area IV, c. central limit theorem
  • What is a sampling distribution? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Introduction to Sampling Distributions". DSST outline area IV, b. sampling distributions
  • The z table gives P(Z < 1.00) = 0.8413. What is P(Z > 1.00)? NIST/SEMATECH e-Handbook of Statistical Methods, section 1.3.6.7.1, "Cumulative Distribution Function of the Standard Normal Distribution". DSST outline area IV, a. standard scores such as z scores

Inferential statistics 20

  • A 95% confidence interval for a mean runs from 42 to 58. What are the point estimate and the margin of error? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: V. Inferential Statistics (20% of the exam), a. confidence intervals
  • A candy maker says its bags hold five colors in equal shares. A buyer counts the colors of 200 candies to test the claim. How many degrees of freedom does the chi-square goodness-of-fit test have? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "One-Way Tables". DSST outline area V, g. non-parametric testing (chi-square for goodness of fit)
  • A chi-square test of independence is run on a contingency table with 3 rows and 4 columns. How many degrees of freedom does it have? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Contingency Tables". DSST outline area V, g. non-parametric testing (chi-square for contingency tables)
  • A company claims that its batteries last more than 50 hours on average. Which hypotheses test this claim? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: V. Inferential Statistics (20% of the exam), b. hypothesis testing (null and alternative, one and two-tailed)
  • A mean is tested with a sample of 16 and the population standard deviation is unknown. Which distribution gives the critical value? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "t Distribution". DSST outline area V, d. inference for the mean of a population (small samples)
  • A new drug really works, but the test fails to reject the null hypothesis of no effect. What has happened? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Type I and II Errors". DSST outline area V, c. Type I and Type II errors
  • A random sample of 100 has mean 50, and the population standard deviation is 10. What is the 95% confidence interval for the population mean? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: V. Inferential Statistics (20% of the exam), a. confidence intervals
  • A report gives a 95% confidence interval for a population mean. What does the "95%" describe? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Confidence Intervals Introduction". DSST outline area V, a. confidence intervals
  • A researcher compares the mean yields of four fertilizers in a single test. Which method is used? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Analysis of Variance: Introduction". DSST outline area V, f. comparing the means of more than two samples (ANOVA)
  • A researcher tests at the 0.01 significance level. If the null hypothesis is true, how probable is a Type I error? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Type I and II Errors". DSST outline area V, c. Type I and Type II errors and level of significance
  • A sample of 100 has mean 103. The null hypothesis is μ = 100 and the population standard deviation is 15. What is the z test statistic? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: V. Inferential Statistics (20% of the exam), d. inference for the mean of a population (large samples)
  • A test gives a p-value of 0.03 and the significance level is 0.05. What is the decision? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Significance Testing". DSST outline area V, b. hypothesis testing, significance level
  • For a z test at the 0.05 significance level, which critical values are right? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: V. Inferential Statistics (20% of the exam), b. hypothesis testing (one and two-tailed), significance level
  • In a one-way ANOVA, how is the F statistic formed? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "One-Factor ANOVA (Between Subjects)". DSST outline area V, f. comparing the means of more than two samples (ANOVA)
  • In a sample of 100 voters, 56% favor a measure. The null hypothesis is p = 0.50. What is the z test statistic? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: V. Inferential Statistics (20% of the exam), d. inference for the proportion of a population
  • In a significance test, what does the probability value (p-value) measure? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Introduction to Hypothesis Testing". DSST outline area V, b. hypothesis testing
  • Twelve patients have their cholesterol measured before and after a diet. Which test compares the two sets of readings? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Difference between Two Means (Correlated Pairs)". DSST outline area V, e. comparing two sample means (t-tests)
  • Two different groups of students use two study methods, and their mean scores are compared. What is the usual null hypothesis? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: V. Inferential Statistics (20% of the exam), e. comparing two sample means and proportions
  • What is a Type I error? Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University), "Type I and II Errors". DSST outline area V, c. Type I and Type II errors
  • With the same data, a 99% confidence interval is computed in place of a 95% one. How does the interval change? Prometric, DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet, content outline: V. Inferential Statistics (20% of the exam), a. confidence intervals

How this list was compiled: Our own questions, written to the content outline of the DSST Principles of Statistics fact sheet (Prometric, revised 11/2021, https://getcollegecredit.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/DSST_PrinciplesofStatistics.pdf, read 2026-10-08): foundations of statistics, probability, correlation and regression, sampling distributions and inferential statistics, 20% each. The bank holds 20 questions in each area. Answers that are arithmetic were recomputed on 2026-10-08 from the numbers the question prints. Each definition was read on 2026-10-08 in the public page named under its question: Online Statistics Education (D. M. Lane, ed., Rice University, public domain), the NIST/SEMATECH e-Handbook of Statistical Methods, or Statistics Canada's Statistics: Power from Data! Licence: Questions, choices and explanations are original work of this site.

How it works

A free Principles of Statistics DSST practice test: 100 questions written for this site, 20 in each of the exam's five content areas, all with the working shown. It is unofficial and not affiliated with Prometric, the owner of the DSST program.

Read the full guide

Five areas, 20% each

The fact sheet (revised 11/2021, read October 8, 2026) splits the exam evenly: foundations of statistics, probability, correlation and regression, sampling distributions, and inferential statistics. The bank matches it with 20 questions in each.

The z table

A standard normal (z) table is provided inside the exam as its first few items, and the fact sheet advises marking those items for review so you can go back to the table. Keep a z table beside you here too.

Timing

The real exam gives 2 hours for 100 questions, and exam mode copies both numbers.

  • Sampling questions turn on the standard error, σ / √n, not on σ itself.
  • Much of the last area is choosing the test: z or t, paired or independent, ANOVA, chi-square.

Questions and answers

Is this statistics DSST practice test like the real exam?

It follows the same outline, but the questions are ours. None comes from the exam or from the fact sheet's sample questions, so a score here predicts nothing about a score there.

Is there a DSST statistics study guide?

Prometric's fact sheet is free and lists every topic with three reference textbooks. For definitions, each answer here links the page it was read in, such as the public-domain book Online Statistics Education.

Can you use a calculator on the DSST Principles of Statistics exam?

Yes. The fact sheet permits a non-programmable calculator, so work these questions with the one you will take.

What score do you need on DSST Principles of Statistics?

The American Council on Education recommends 3 semester hours of lower-level credit at a score of 400. That figure is on the exam's own scale, and each college sets the score it accepts.

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