Contact Us

If you still have questions or prefer to get help directly from an agent, please submit a request.
We’ll get back to you as soon as possible.

Please fill out the contact form below and we will reply as soon as possible.

  • Courses
  • Find a Job
  • Home
  • Economics, Finance, & Analytics
  • Research, Quantitative Analysis, & Decision Science

Poisson Distribution - Explained

What is a Poisson Distribution?

Written by Jason Gordon

Updated at April 16th, 2022

Contact Us

If you still have questions or prefer to get help directly from an agent, please submit a request.
We’ll get back to you as soon as possible.

Please fill out the contact form below and we will reply as soon as possible.

  • Marketing, Advertising, Sales & PR
    Principles of Marketing Sales Advertising Public Relations SEO, Social Media, Direct Marketing
  • Accounting, Taxation, and Reporting
    Managerial & Financial Accounting & Reporting Business Taxation
  • Professionalism & Career Development
  • Law, Transactions, & Risk Management
    Government, Legal System, Administrative Law, & Constitutional Law Legal Disputes - Civil & Criminal Law Agency Law HR, Employment, Labor, & Discrimination Business Entities, Corporate Governance & Ownership Business Transactions, Antitrust, & Securities Law Real Estate, Personal, & Intellectual Property Commercial Law: Contract, Payments, Security Interests, & Bankruptcy Consumer Protection Insurance & Risk Management Immigration Law Environmental Protection Law Inheritance, Estates, and Trusts
  • Business Management & Operations
    Operations, Project, & Supply Chain Management Strategy, Entrepreneurship, & Innovation Business Ethics & Social Responsibility Global Business, International Law & Relations Business Communications & Negotiation Management, Leadership, & Organizational Behavior
  • Economics, Finance, & Analytics
    Economic Analysis & Monetary Policy Research, Quantitative Analysis, & Decision Science Investments, Trading, and Financial Markets Banking, Lending, and Credit Industry Business Finance, Personal Finance, and Valuation Principles
  • Courses
+ More

Table of Contents

What is a Poisson Distribution?How is a Poisson Distribution Used?Academic Research on Poisson Distribution

What is a Poisson Distribution?

A Poisson distribution refers to a statistical distribution reflecting the possible number of times in which an event would occur within a given timeframe. It is utilized for independent events that happen at a consistent rate within a specific interval of time. The Poisson distribution is a discrete function, which means that the event can only be measured as occurring or not as occurring. This means that the variable can be measured in whole numbers alone. Fractional happenings of the event aren't a part of the model.

Back to: RESEARCH, ANALYSIS, & DECISION SCIENCE

How is a Poisson Distribution Used?

For instance, supposing the average number of individuals who rent movies on a Friday night in just one code store is 400, a Poisson distribution is capable of answering such questions as, "What is the likelihood that above 600 individuals would rent movies?" Thus, applying Poisson distribution makes it possible for managers to introduce optimal scheduling systems. A major prominent historical, practical function of the Poisson distribution was the estimation of the annual number of Prussian cavalry soldiers who were killed from horse-kicks. Other modern instances include estimating the number of auto crashes in a city of a specific size; in physiology, this distribution is usually utilized for calculating the probabilistic frequencies of various neurotransmitter secretion types.



poisson distribution

Was this article helpful?

Yes
No

Related Articles

  • Analysis of Means - Explained
  • Three Way ANOVA - Explained
  • Predictive Analytics - Explained



©2011-2023. The Business Professor, LLC.
  • Privacy

  • Questions

Definition by Author

0
0
Expand