In a performance group, there are 5 men and 8 women. Among them, there are 4 married couples. If we need to choose 2 individuals – 1 man and 1 woman, what is the likelihood that one of the couples is chosen?

To determine the probability that one of the couples is chosen when selecting 1 man and 1 woman from the group, we can follow these steps:

Step 1: Determine the total number of ways to choose 1 man and 1 woman.

There are 5 men and 8 women, so the total number of ways to choose 1 man and 1 woman is:

$5 \times 8 = 40$

Step 2: Determine the number of favorable outcomes where a couple is chosen.

There are 4 married couples, so there are 4 favorable ways to choose a couple.