Vineis P
Dipartimento di Scienze Biomediche e Oncologie Umana, Ospedale di S. Giovanni Battista, Torino, Italy.
IARC Sci Publ. 1997(142):59-71.
Epidemiology is interested in variation. The goal of epidemiological research is to infer cause-effect relationships by observing whether the occurrence of disease varies according to relevant exposures. Epidemiology is usually interested in 'intergroup' variation (e.g. between those who are exposed and those who are unexposed to the factor of interest), while 'intragroup' variation is a source of noise. Therefore, the study design aims to increase intergroup variability, to limit intragroup variability and to reduce error by ensuring validity and reliability of measurements. The goal of this chapter is to summarize simple ways to recognize the main sources of measurement error and to estimate the extent and the impact of such error.
流行病学关注变异。流行病学研究的目标是通过观察疾病的发生是否根据相关暴露因素而变化来推断因果关系。流行病学通常关注“组间”变异（例如，暴露于感兴趣因素的人群与未暴露人群之间的变异），而“组内”变异是噪声来源。因此，研究设计旨在增加组间变异性，限制组内变异性，并通过确保测量的有效性和可靠性来减少误差。本章的目标是总结识别测量误差主要来源的简单方法，并估计此类误差的程度和影响。
