Question

A dance class consists of 22 students, of which 10 are women and 12 are men. if 5 men and 5 women are to be chosen and then paired off, how many results are possible?

Answer 1

solution:

I choose 5 women from a pool of 10 in 10C2 ways.

I choose 5 men from a pool of 12 in 12C2 ways.

So total number of ways of choosing in 10C2 x 12C2. Now I need to arrange them in 5 pairs. This is where I have a different solution. The solution says that there are 5! ways to arrange them in pairs.

But I cant seem to understand why? My reasoning is that for first pair position I need to choose 1 man from 5 and 1 woman from 5. So for the first position I have 5 x 5 choices (5 for man and 5 for woman). Similarly for the second position I have 4 x 4 choices and so on. Hence the total ways are 5! x 5!

So I calculate the total ways as 10C2 * 12C2 * 5! * 5!. Can anyone point the flaw in my reasoning for arranging the chosen men and women in pairs.