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Appendix 4 Glossary
(See also Appendix 5 Common terms (and some of their alternatives) used in
statistics.)
For more information, try also looking up a word in the index, especially if it is
not included here.
Words in bold have their own definition.
Acronym
A real, or at least pronounceable, word made up from
the initial letters of a phrase or list; they can provide a
useful mnemonic (see Big Five and SWOT analysis for
examples)
Action research A reflective and iterative process of diagnosis, planning
and review to solve problems and improve professional
practice
Amnesia
Loss of memory; see Retrograde amnesia and Anterograde
amnesia
Anterograde Amnesia for new events occurring after the trauma – a
amnesia head injury, for example – that caused the amnesia
Anthropomorphism The attribution of human characteristics and qualities to
non-human beings or inanimate objects
Autism
A developmental disorder characterized by severe impairments
in social interactions and language, resulting in
restricted interests, repetitive behaviour and an obsessive
desire for sameness
Base rate neglect The tendency we all have to make judgements about the
likelihood (probability) of something happening without
taking into account the prior odds (base rate) of that thing
happening; one of the main reasons why we need statistics
to help us evaluate information (see the examples in
the section an ‘Experimental design and statistics’ (pages
44–48); also known as the base rate fallacy
Benchmark
A standard against which you measure or compare
something