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Frequency of occurrence for each possible "probability of derangement" for a Secret Santa drawing in which each person draws a name in sequence and the only person who does not draw someone else's name is the one who draws the final name.
4

%I #46 Apr 10 2024 09:26:54

%S 1,1,1,1,5,2,1,1,13,6,13,2,6,2,1,1,29,14,73,6,42,18,29,2,18,8,14,2,6,

%T 2,1,1,61,30,301,14,186,86,301,6,102,48,186,18,102,42,61,2,42,20,86,8,

%U 48,20,30,2,18,8,14,2,6,2,1,1,125,62,1081,30,690,330,2069,14,414,200,1394

%N Frequency of occurrence for each possible "probability of derangement" for a Secret Santa drawing in which each person draws a name in sequence and the only person who does not draw someone else's name is the one who draws the final name.

%C The sequence is best represented as a series of columns 1..n, where each column j has 2^(j-1) rows (see Example). For more details, see A136300.

%C The first column represents the case for 3 people (offset 3).

%H Brian Parsonnet, <a href="/A136301/b136301.txt">Table of n, a(n) for n = 3..257</a>

%H Brian Parsonnet, <a href="/A136301/a136301.pdf">Probability of Derangements</a>

%F H(r,c) = Sum_{j=0..c-L(r)-1} H(T(r), L(r)+j) * M(c-T(r)-1, j) where M(y,z) = binomial distribution (y,z) when y - 1 > z and (y,z)-1 when y-1 <= z and T(r) = A053645 and L(r) = A000523.

%F Conjecture: Assume the table represented as in the Example section. Then row 2^n is row n + 1 of A371761. - _Peter Luschny_, Apr 10 2024

%e Represented as a series of columns, where column j has 2^(j-1) rows, the sequence begins:

%e row |j = 1 2 3 4 5 ...

%e ----+-------------------------

%e 1 | 1 1 1 1 1 ...

%e 2 | 1 5 13 29 ...

%e 3 | 2 6 14 30 ...

%e 4 | 1 13 73 301 ...

%e 5 | 2 6 14 ...

%e 6 | 6 42 186 ...

%e 7 | 2 18 86 ...

%e 8 | 1 29 301 ...

%e 9 | 2 6 ...

%e 10 | 18 102 ...

%e 11 | 8 48 ...

%e 12 | 14 186 ...

%e 13 | 2 18 ...

%e 14 | 6 102 ...

%e 15 | 2 42 ...

%e 16 | 1 61 ...

%e 17 | 2 ...

%e ... | ... ...

%e .

%e If there are 5 people, numbered 1-5 according to the order in which they draw a name, and person #5 draws name #5, the first four people must draw 1-4 as a proper derangement, and there are 9 ways of doing so: 21435 / 23415 / 24135 / 31425 / 34125 / 34215 / 41235 / 43125 / 43215.

%e But the probability of each derangement depends on how many choices exist at each successive draw. The first person can draw from 4 possibilities (2,3,4,5). The second person nominally has 3 to choose from, unless the first person drew number 2, in which case person 2 may draw 4 possibilities (1,3,4,5), and so on. The probabilities of 21435 and 24135 are both then

%e 1/4 * 1/4 * 1/2 * 1/2 = 1/64.

%e More generally, if there are n people, at the i-th turn (i = 1..n), person i has either (n-i) or (n-i+1) choices, depending on whether the name of the person who is drawing has been chosen yet. A way to represent the two cases above is 01010, where a 0 indicates that the person's number is not yet drawn, and a 1 indicates it is.

%e For the n-th person to be forced to choose his or her own name, the last digit of this pattern must be 0, by definition. Similarly, the 1st digit must be a 0, and the second to last digit must be a 1. So all the problem patterns start with 0 and end with 10. For 5 people, that leaves 4 target patterns which cover all 9 derangements. By enumeration, that distribution can be shown to be (for the 3rd column = 5 person case):

%e 0-00-10 1 occurrences

%e 0-01-10 5 occurrences

%e 0-10-10 2 occurrences

%e 0-11-11 1 occurrences

%e 1;

%e 1, 1;

%e 1, 5, 2, 1;

%e 1, 13, 6, 13, 2, 6, 2, 1;

%e 1, 29, 14, 73, 6, 42, 18, 29, 2, 18, 8, 14, 2, 6, 2, 1;

%t maxP = 15;

%t rows = Range[1, 2^(nP = maxP - 3)];

%t pasc = Table[

%t Binomial[p + 1, i] - If[i >= p, 1, 0], {p, nP}, {i, 0, p}];

%t sFreq = Table[0, {maxP - 1}, {2^nP}]; sFreq[[2 ;; maxP - 1, 1]] = 1;

%t For[p = 1, p <= nP, p++,

%t For[s = 1, s <= p, s++, rS = Range[2^(s - 1) + 1, 2^s];

%t sFreq[[p + 2, rS]] = pasc[[p + 1 - s, 1 ;; p + 2 - s]] .

%t sFreq[[s ;; p + 1, 1 ;; 2^(s - 1)]]]];

%t TableForm[ Transpose[ sFreq ] ]

%t (* Code snippet to illustrate the conjectured connection with A371761: *)

%t R[n_] := Table[Transpose[sFreq][[2^n]][[r]], {r, n + 1, maxP - 1}]

%t For[n = 0, n <= 6, n++, Print[n + 1, ": ", R[n]]] (* _Peter Luschny_, Apr 10 2024 *)

%Y The application of this table towards final determination of the probabilities of derangements leads to sequence A136300, which is the sequence of numerators. The denominators are in A001044.

%Y A048144 represents the peak value of all odd-numbers columns.

%Y A000255 equals the sum of the bottom half of each column.

%Y A000166 equals the sum of each column.

%Y A047920 represents the frequency of replacements by person drawing at position n.

%Y A008277, Triangle of Stirling numbers of 2nd kind, can be derived from A136301 through a series of transformations (see "Probability of Derangements.pdf").

%Y Cf. A371761.

%K uned,nonn,tabf

%O 3,5

%A _Brian Parsonnet_, Mar 22 2008

%E Edited by _Brian Parsonnet_, Mar 01 2011