Error Rate
Definition
One of the Daubert factors: the known or potential rate at which a method produces false positives or false negatives, and whether the standards controlling the technique's operation are defined. For forensic methods, error rate is often cited as the least satisfied factor.
Related terms
- Abuse of Discretion
- The standard of appellate review established by Joiner for Daubert rulings. An appellate court will reverse a trial judge's gatekeeping decision only...
- Base-Rate Fallacy
- Ignoring the background frequency (base rate) of a characteristic when interpreting a match. A test specific to 1 in 10,000 people still...
- Daubert Gatekeeping
- The judicial function under Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals (1993) and Federal Rules of Evidence Rule 702, requiring the trial judge to...
- Daubert Trilogy
- The three US Supreme Court decisions that together define the federal standard for expert testimony admissibility: Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals (1993),...
- Federal Rule of Evidence 702
- The US federal rule governing expert testimony. As amended through 2023, it requires that expert opinion be based on sufficient facts or...
- Frye Standard
- The US legal test for admissibility of scientific evidence, originating from Frye v. United States (1923), which required that a technique be...
- Likelihood Ratio (LR)
- The ratio of two conditional probabilities: the probability of the observed evidence given the prosecution's hypothesis (same source), divided by the probability...
- Measurement Uncertainty
- A quantitative statement of the range within which the true value of a measurement lies, at a stated confidence level (typically 95%,...
- Probabilistic Reporting
- The practice of stating a dental age estimate as a range with an associated probability (e.g. a 95% confidence interval) rather than...
- Prosecutor's Fallacy
- The error of treating the RMP (or its reciprocal) as the probability that the defendant is innocent, or as the probability that...
Explained in these topics
- Error, Uncertainty and the Statistics of Forensic ScienceThe frequency with which a test or method produces an incorrect result under defined conditions. Includes both false positives (spurious matches) and false neg...
- The Daubert Standard and Its ProgenyOne of the Daubert factors: the known or potential rate at which a method produces false positives or false negatives, and whether the standards controlling th...