Confidence Intervals for Clustered Samples

Bibliographic Data

ID5620673
AuthorsLeslie Kish (corresponding author)
Year1957
Volume22
Issue2
Pages154
Publication date1957-04-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueAmerican Sociological Review (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0003-1224 • E-ISSN: 1939-8271
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.2307/2088852
OpenAlexW2314052990
LanguageEN
Citations received29
References cited2

1. It minimizes the likelihood that the investigator will present to himself and the world a prematurely coherent set of propositions in which contradictory propositions, however plausible, are ignored. The procedure requires that a range of contradictory propositions be made explicit before the empirical investigation, and it should conduce to theoretical humility after the fact. Projects are less likely to culminate in particularistic interpretations in terms of a single theory. 2. This procedure increases the likelihood of the researcher's building into his researchdesign provisions for the test of a variety of theoretical interpretations of a number of possible empirical findings. 3. The proposed procedure makes the researcher more aware of the total significance of his empirical findings. Where, as in the usual procedure, the investigator is concerned with upholding or refuting a particular theory, he may be completely unaware of the fact that his empirical findings actually add confirmation, or doubt, as the case may be, to numerous other theoretical propositions extant in the area or in related areas. 4. The procedure employed here makes for continuity of research. At the present state of theoretical development in sociology it is rare that clear-cut, unambiguous interpretations are possible after a single research project. Where there is little in the way of theory to guide interpretation, subsequent empirical investigations of alternative interpretations are often necessary. Where alternate interpretations are made explicit from the beginning of the project, they are more likely to survive as alternatives after the fact of investigation: the present procedure encourages research programs rather than isolated projects.8

Confidence interval · Statistics · Census and Population Estimation · Computational and Text Analysis Methods · Data Analysis with R · Mathematics