BIOMETRICS: data

organization of data

1. cases

2. variables

case

• smallest independent entity from which measurements can be taken

• represented as rows

variables

• characteristic of cases

• represented by columns

types of variables

1. treatment variable

2. response variable

treatment variable

• any characteristic that influences experiment

• fixed treatment variable

  • determined by researcher

• random treatment

  • initial conditions not controlled by the researcher

response variables

characteristics measured during or end of experiment

variable level types

1. treatments

2. blocks

treatment

defines what experimenter is investigating

block

• initial grouping to minimize confounding factors

  • randomly assign treatments

  • proportional representation of each group in each treatment