The Danger of Measurement

Measurement has too often been the leitmotif of many investigations rather than the experimental examination of hypotheses. Mounds of data are collected, which are statistically decorous and methodologically unimpeachable, but conclusions are often trivial and rarely useful in decision making. This results from an overly rigorous control of an insignificant variable and a widespread deficiency in the framing of pertinent questions. Investigators seem to have settled for what is measurable instead of measuring what they would really like to know.

Notes:

Is that it can replace testing hypotheses. We gather data instead of validating exactly what it is we'd like to know.

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Statistics (0.907083): dbpedia | freebase | opencyc
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 Patient Care—Mystical Research or Researchable Mystique
Periodicals>Journal Article:  Pellegrino, Edmund D. (1964), Patient Care—Mystical Research or Researchable Mystique, Clinical Research, (1964), 12, no. 4, 422. , Retrieved on 2012-06-20