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Types of Errors

This document discusses different types of errors that can occur in scientific measurements and experiments. It defines systematic error as a predictable bias or offset in measurements. Random error is unpredictable variability that occurs due to uncontrolled factors. Both systematic and random errors can be reduced through careful calibration of instruments, standardized procedures, and averaging multiple measurements. The document provides examples of different sources of errors like imperfect calibration, approximation errors, and parallax errors.

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SATYAJIT BEHERA
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114 views

Types of Errors

This document discusses different types of errors that can occur in scientific measurements and experiments. It defines systematic error as a predictable bias or offset in measurements. Random error is unpredictable variability that occurs due to uncontrolled factors. Both systematic and random errors can be reduced through careful calibration of instruments, standardized procedures, and averaging multiple measurements. The document provides examples of different sources of errors like imperfect calibration, approximation errors, and parallax errors.

Uploaded by

SATYAJIT BEHERA
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PPT, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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• In statistics, an error (or residual) is not a "mistake" but rather

a difference between a computed, estimated, or measured


value and the accepted true, specified, or theoretically correct
value.

• In science and engineering in general an error is defined as a


difference between the desired and actual performance

• Engineers seek to design devices, machines and systems and


in such a way as to mitigate or preferably avoid the effects of
error, whether unintentional or not.
1. Systematic error which always occurs, with the same value, when
we use the instrument in the same way and in the same case

1. Random error which may vary from observation to observation.


Systematic error is sometimes called statistical bias. It may often be
reduced by very carefully standardized procedures. Part of the
education in every science is how to use the standard instruments of the
discipline.
Systematic error may also be an error having a nonzero mean, so that its effect
is not reduced when observations are averaged
Systematic Errors in the Sciences
Imperfect Calibration

If you consider an experimenter taking a reading of the time period of a


pendulum swinging past a fiducial marker: If their stop-watch or timer starts
with 1 second on the clock then all of their results will be off by 1 second (zero
error). If the experimenter repeats this experiment twenty times (starting at 1
second each time), then there will be a percentage error in the calculated
average of their results.

Distance measured by radar will be systematically overestimated if the slight


slowing down of the waves in air is not accounted for. Incorrect zeroing of an
instrument leading to a zero error is an example of systematic error in
instrumentation.

Such errors cannot be removed by repeating measurements or averaging large


numbers of results. A common method to remove systematic error is through
calibration of the measurement instrument.
The concept of random error is closely related to the concept of precision. The
higher the precision of a measurement instrument, the smaller the variability (
standard deviation) of the fluctuations in its readings.

The random error (or random variation) is due to factors which we cannot (or do
not) control. It may be too expensive or we may be too ignorant of these factors to
control them each time we measure. It may even be that whatever we are trying
to measure is changing in time.

They are scattered about the true value, and tend to have null arithmetic mean
when a measurement is repeated several times with the same instrument.
Systematic versus Random error
•Random error is always present in a measurement. It is caused by inherently
unpredictable fluctuations in the readings of a measurement apparatus or in the
experimenter's interpretation of the instrumental reading.

•Systematic error, however, is predictable and typically constant or proportional


to the true value. If the cause of the systematic error can be identified, then it
usually can be eliminated.

•Systematic errors are caused by imperfect calibration of measurement


instruments or imperfect methods of observation, or interference of the
environment with the measurement process, and always affect the results of an
experiment in a predictable direction.

•Incorrect zeroing of an instrument leading to a zero error is an example of


systematic error in instrumentation.
Approximation error
The approximation error in some data is the discrepancy between an exact
value and some approximation to it.

An approximation error can occur because –

1. The measurement of the data is not precise due to the instruments. (e.g.,
the accurate reading of a piece of paper is 4.5 cm but since the ruler does not
use decimals, you round it to 5 cm.) or
2. Approximations are used instead of the real data (e.g., 3.14 instead of π).

Graph of (blue) with its


linear approximation
(red) at a = 0. The approximation
error is the gap between the
curves, and it increases for x values
further from 0.
Given some value v and its approximation vapprox, the absolute error is

If the relative error is

The percent error is the relative error expressed in terms of per 100.
Uses of relative error
• There are two features of relative error that should be kept in mind.

• Firstly, relative error is undefined when the true value is 0.

• Secondly, relative error only makes sense when measured on a ratio scale,
(i.e. a scale which has a true meaningful zero), otherwise it would be
sensitive to the measurement units .

• For example, when an absolute error in a temperature measurement


given in Celsius is 1° and the true value is 2 °C, the relative error is 0.5 and
the percent error is 50%. For this same case, when the temperature is
given in Kelvin, the same 1° absolute error with the same true value of
275.15° K gives a relative error of 0.00363 and a percent error of only
0.363%. Celsius temperature is measured on an interval scale, whereas
the Kelvin scale has a true zero and so is a ratio scale.
Parallax error in measurement instruments

A simplified illustration of the parallax of an object against a distant


background due to a perspective shift. When viewed from "Viewpoint A", the
object appears to be in front of the blue square. When the viewpoint is
changed to "Viewpoint B", the object appears to have moved in front of the
red square.…

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