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Statistics vocabulary · Sampling

Sampling frame

Meaning in statistics, with examples

nounCommon term

In statistics, sampling frame means: The actual list or source from which a sample is drawn, such as a student register, a customer database or a list of addresses.

In Turkish: örnekleme çerçevesi

How it is used

Ideally it matches the target population exactly; in practice it rarely does, and the gap (coverage error) can cause bias. Methods sections should name the sampling frame and say how up to date it was.

Example sentences

  1. Our sampling frame was the company's customer database, so people who only pay in cash were missed.

  2. An outdated sampling frame can leave out whole groups of the population.

Common collocations

  • construct a sampling frame
  • incomplete sampling frame
  • coverage error
  • draw from the sampling frame
  • populationThe whole group of people, items or events that a study wants to draw conclusions about, for example all adults in a country or all invoices issued in one year.
  • sampleA smaller group selected from a population and actually studied, so that conclusions about the whole population can be drawn from it.
  • random sampleA sample chosen so that every member of the population has a known, usually equal, chance of being selected, which helps avoid systematic bias.
  • biasA systematic error that pushes results in one direction, so that estimates are consistently too high or too low rather than just randomly off.
  • stratified samplingA sampling method in which the population is first divided into subgroups (strata), such as regions or age groups, and a random sample is then taken from each one.

More terms: Sampling

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