Research Terms
Research has its own vocabulary, and it's the vocabulary that decides what counts as evidence. This category explains the words you'll meet in studies and evidence reviews, so you can read a finding and understand how much weight it carries. It covers the study designs and methods that separate a strong result from a shaky one, like what makes a trial trustworthy and why combining studies can sharpen the picture. Knowing these terms helps you tell a real finding from a headline. Good evidence is the floor everything else on this site is built on.
12 terms
Download the Research Terms cheat sheet (PDF)All research terms terms
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Bias
In research, bias is a systematic error that pushes a study's results in a particular direction. It distorts findings in ways that random chance doesn't.
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Confidence Interval
A confidence interval is a range of values that likely contains the true result. It shows how precise a study's estimate is.
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Correlation and Causation
Correlation means two things tend to move together. Causation means one actually makes the other happen. A correlation alone doesn't prove cause.
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Double-Blind
Double-blind means neither the participants nor the researchers know who is getting the real treatment versus the comparison during a study. Hiding this reduces bias and makes results more trustworthy.
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Effect Size
Effect size is a number that describes how large an effect is, not just whether it exists. It tells you whether a result is big enough to matter in real life.
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Meta-Analysis
A meta-analysis is a study that statistically combines the results of many separate studies on the same question. Pooling the data gives a clearer, more reliable estimate than any single study can on its own.
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P-Value
A p-value is a statistic that estimates how likely a result would be if there were no real effect. It's widely misunderstood and often mistaken for proof.
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Peer Review
Peer review is the process where independent experts evaluate a study before it's published. It's a quality check that catches many problems, but it doesn't guarantee a study is correct.
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Placebo
A placebo is an inactive treatment, like a sugar pill, used as a comparison in research. Comparing a real treatment against a placebo helps show whether the treatment itself is what's working.
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Randomized Controlled Trial
A randomized controlled trial is a study that randomly assigns participants to a treatment group or a comparison group. That random assignment is what makes it the strongest design for showing whether a treatment actually causes an effect.
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Statistical Significance
Statistical significance means a result is unlikely to be due to chance alone. It does not tell you whether the result is large or important.
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Systematic Review
A systematic review is a structured summary that gathers and appraises all the studies on a specific question. It sits near the top of the evidence hierarchy.
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Conditions
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Therapy Terms
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Psychiatry Terms
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Psychology Terms
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Brain and Body Terms
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Everyday Language
29 termsWords people use casually that have specific clinical meanings.
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