Question

owners of a fast - food restaurant chain want to survey their customers throughout the united states, but this is economically impractical. instead, the owners randomly select one state from which to collect data.
what sampling method did the owners use?
cluster sampling
systematic sampling
simple random sampling
stratified sampling

Explanation:

In cluster sampling, the population is divided into clusters (here, states are clusters), and a random cluster (one state) is selected to sample from. The owners divided the US into state - level clusters and randomly chose one state, matching cluster sampling. Systematic sampling uses a fixed interval, simple random sampling selects individual units randomly (not clusters), and stratified sampling divides into strata and samples from each, so cluster sampling is correct.

Answer:

A. cluster sampling