Glossary | |
These is glossary of research key terms. This glossary is intended as an aid to
professionals and non-professionals who find the world of research
somewhat intimidating. While it is impossible to cover all the terms
that can be confusing, this document briefly defines some of the more
common terms and concepts. | |
| You can always search for entries (regexp permitted). | |
|
Submit Term | |
| All | |
| Pages: «1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 » | |
| Term | Definition |
| Clinical trial | A large-scale experiment designed to test the effectiveness of a clinical treatment. |
| Closed system | A closed system has no inputs from or outputs to any external world and hence is totally isolated. Scientific experiments seek to create this so the effects of deliberate causal variation of one thing can be seen without having to worry whether the cause was external. |
| Cluster Sampling | 1. A multi-stage sampling scheme in which the population is first divided into clusters, then a sample of these clusters is chosen via simple random sampling, and then a simple random sample of population elements is selected within the chosen clusters. This differs from stratified sampling in that in stratified sampling, all strata are sampled, whereas in cluster sampling we take a sample of clusters, not all clusters. Cluster sampling is used when it is difficult to construct a sampling frame for the entire population, or when it is too costly to visit randomly chosen population elements. 2. a probability sampling strategy involving successive sampling of units (or clusters); the units sampled progress from larger ones to smaller ones (e.g. health authority/health board, trust, senior managers). |
| Coding | A procedure for transforming raw data into a standardised format for data analysis purposes. Coding qualitative data involves identifying recurrent words, concepts or themes. In positivist research, coding involves attaching numerical values to categories. |
| Column Percents | Percentages in a table that add down to 100. |
| Conceptualization | The process of clarifying and specifying the meaning(s) of variables in a problem statement or hypothesis in order to facilitate examination of relevant research by refining and developing a clear, precise, testable hypothesis. |
| Concordant pair | a pair of cases in which one member of the pair is higher than the other member on both variables. |
| Glossary V2.0 | |

Glossary