Level of observation
What is the level of observation in a dataset?
What one row in a dataset stands for.
The level of observation answers a simple question: what is one row? In Sibling Interviews, one row is one person, because we interviewed people. A table of countries has one row per country, and a table of World Cup matches has one row per match.
It is worth writing down in plain words before you analyze anything. Two datasets about the same topic can have different levels of observation, and mixing them up leads to wrong conclusions.
From our own dataset
In our interviews table, the level of observation is one person.
Where we teach it
Lesson 1.2 of Project 1: Sibling Interviews. Watch lesson 1.2 and read the notes, free with a free account.
Related terms
- Observation: A complete record of the characteristics we observed about one person or thing.
- Row: A horizontal line of cells.
- Dataset: Data organized into a table so it can be analyzed.