Friday, May 14, 2010

Chapter 14

1). Pick one concept from Chapter 14 that you found useful or interesting.

I found chapter 14 to be easy to understand. I have always heard of generalizations and I thought I knew what they were. However, I was surprised to find out what it really was through the book's examples. I like where they break down what makes a good generalization. First of all, the sample size matters. You can't create a conclusion from only surveying a few people. The larger the sample, the more accurate it will probably be. Secondly, the sample must be studied well. This means that the proper questions or procedures need to be done correctly in order to ensure your generalization is accurate. Other requirements for a good generalization are the margin of error, variation in population, risk, and analogies. Generalizations remind me a lot of the statistics class I am taking currently. Statistics are basically generalizations about a population through a sample. One gathers information from a sample, calculates, and creates generalizations for the entire population.

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