statistical significance
Not random chance
Statistical significance is a measure indicating that a research result is unlikely to have occurred by chance alone.
When a finding is statistically significant, the probability of observing it if there were no real effect falls below a chosen threshold—typically 5%.
The term is central to hypothesis testing in science and social research: The study found a statistically significant link between sleep and memory.
Statistical significance doesn't necessarily mean the effect is large or practically important, only that it's probably real.
Probability under null hypothesis
- null hypothesisAssumed no relationship exists
- t-testHypothesis check for averages
- chi-squareStatistic for categorical data
- ANOVACompares means among groups
hypothesis testing · degrees of freedom · F-test · parametric · nonparametric
Quantity of observations taken
- confidence intervalEstimated bounds for population parameter
- standard errorStatistic's expected deviation measure
- margin of errorAllowable deviation from truth
- replicationAct of duplicating precisely
generalizability · precision · reliability · validity · reproducibility · relative risk
Incorrect presence indication
- false negativeIncorrectly absent finding
- powerEnergy transfer rate
- alphaFirst Greek letter
- betaGreek alphabet's second letter
Expert evaluation before publication
- publication biasPreference for significant results
- research methodologyFramework for conducting investigations
- empirical evidenceProof from measurable observation
- preregistrationSigning up before official enrollment
p-value
Probability under null hypothesis
- null hypothesisAssumed no relationship exists
- t-testHypothesis check for averages
- chi-squareStatistic for categorical data
ANOVA · hypothesis testing · degrees of freedom · F-test · parametric · nonparametric
sample size
Quantity of observations taken
- confidence intervalEstimated bounds for population parameter
- standard errorStatistic's expected deviation measure
- margin of errorAllowable deviation from truth
replication · generalizability · precision · reliability · validity · reproducibility · relative risk
false positive
Incorrect presence indication
- false negativeIncorrectly absent finding
- powerEnergy transfer rate
- alphaFirst Greek letter
cutoff
Point of termination
- thresholdPoint of beginning
peer review
Expert evaluation before publication
- publication biasPreference for significant results
- research methodologyFramework for conducting investigations
- empirical evidenceProof from measurable observation
- research methodsexperiment, hypothesis, deduction, experiments, induction
- scientific methodexperiment, theory, data, hypothesis, observation
- statisticsmean, median, mode, variance, standard deviation
- metricsKPI, metric, KPIs, metrics, analytics
- biostatisticsANOVA, t-tests, confidence interval, p-value, correlation
- Clinical Researchclinical guidelines, randomized trials, double-blind, placebo, control groups
statistical significanceanecdotal evidence
Support from individual accounts
intuition · gut feeling · clinical judgment · expert opinion · eyeballing
significance, significant, statistics, insignificant, significantly, statistic, statistical, insignificance, signifying