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ERIC Number: EJ831506
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2009-Mar
Pages: 19
Abstractor: As Provided
Reference Count: 55
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0278-7393
Sources of Bias in the Goodman-Kruskal Gamma Coefficient Measure of Association: Implications for Studies of Metacognitive Processes
Masson, Michael E. J.; Rotello, Caren M.
Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, v35 n2 p509-527 Mar 2009
In many cognitive, metacognitive, and perceptual tasks, measurement of performance or prediction accuracy may be influenced by response bias. Signal detection theory provides a means of assessing discrimination accuracy independent of such bias, but its application crucially depends on distributional assumptions. The Goodman-Kruskal gamma coefficient, "G", has been proposed as an alternative means of measuring accuracy that is free of distributional assumptions. This measure is widely used with tasks that assess metamemory or metacognition performance. The authors demonstrate that the empirically determined value of "G" systematically deviates from its actual value under realistic conditions. A distribution-specific variant of "G", called "G[subscript c]", is introduced to show why this bias arises. The findings imply that caution is needed when using "G" as a measure of accuracy, and alternative measures are recommended. (Contains 5 tables, 11 figures and 3 footnotes.)
American Psychological Association. Journals Department, 750 First Street NE, Washington, DC 20002-4242. Tel: 800-374-2721; Tel: 202-336-5510; Fax: 202-336-5502; e-mail: order@apa.org; Web site: http://www.apa.org/publications
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Descriptive
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers: N/A