How long is a piece of Strix? Methods in measuring and measuring the measurers

Viscardi, P., Sakamoto, M. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6447-406X and Sigwart, J. D. (2010) How long is a piece of Strix? Methods in measuring and measuring the measurers. Zoomorphology, 129 (3). pp. 185-194. ISSN 1432-234X doi: 10.1007/s00435-010-0111-y

Abstract/Summary

An experiment to quantify intra- and interobserver error in anatomical measurements found that interobserver measurements can vary by over 14% of mean specimen length; disparity in measurement increases logarithmically with the number of contributors; instructions did not reduce variation or measurement disparity; scale of the specimen influenced the precision of measurement (relative error increasing with specimen size); different methods of taking a measurement yielded different results, although they did not differ in terms of precision, and topographical complexity of the elements being considered may potentially influence error (error increasing with complexity). These results highlight concerns about introduction of noise and potential bias that should be taken into account when compiling composite datasets and meta-analyses.

Item Type	Article
URI	https://reading-clone.eprints-hosting.org/id/eprint/117251
Item Type	Article
Refereed	Yes
Divisions	Life Sciences > School of Biological Sciences > Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Publisher	Springer
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