PURPOSE Issues related to the validity and reliability of measurement instruments used in research are reviewed. SUMMARY Key indicators of the quality of a measuring instrument are the reliability and validity of the measures. The process of developing and validating an instrument is in large part focused on reducing error in the measurement process. Reliability estimates evaluate the stabili...

Upcoming decades will experience increasing atmospheric CO2 and likely enhanced O3 exposure which represents a risk for the carbon sink strength of forests, so that the need for cause-effect related O3 risk assessment increases. Although assessment will gain in reliability on an O3 uptake basis, risk is co-determined by the effective dose, i.e. the plant's sensitivity per O3 uptake. Recent prog...

Liquid chromatography-electrospray ionization mass spectrometry (LC-MS) is an effective and popular technique used in lipid metabolomic studies. Although many LC-MS methods enabling the determination of sphingolipid molecular species have been reported, they do not cover a broad range of sphingolipid metabolites with expanding glycerophospholipids (GPLs) and diacylglycerol (DAG). In this study,...

Calibrating and validating a traffic simulation model for use on a transportation network is a process that depends on field data that is often limited, but essential for determining inputs to the model and for assessing its reliability. A quantification and systemization of the calibration/validation process exposes statistical issues inherent in the use of such data. Our purpose is to elucida...

We conducted this study to determine the perceived value of certification in perioperative nursing. Following development and pilot-testing, we mailed the 18-item Likert-type instrument, the Perceived Value of Certification Tool (PVCT), to a sample of 2750 perioperative nurses who had earned the CNOR or CRNFA credential or both. A total of 1398 surveys were returned (50.8% response rate). Facto...

Consensus approaches have been widely used to identify Gene Regulatory Networks (GRNs) that are common to multiple studies. However, in this research we develop an application that semi-automatically identifies key mechanisms that are specific to a particular set of conditions. We analyse four different types of cancer to identify gene pathways unique to each of them. To support the results rel...

Diminished assertiveness has been associated with neuroticism, depression, and anxiety. Although many assertiveness instruments have been developed for research and clinical purposes, one common shortcoming is a lack of discriminant validity with regard to aggression. Further, the wording of many instruments is outdated and discriminatory. The goal of the present research was to develop a more ...

This paper presents a complete iris identification system including three main stages: iris segmentation, signature extraction, and signature comparison. An accurate and robust pupil and iris segmentation process, taking into account eyelid occlusions, is first detailed and evaluated. Then, an original wavelet-packet-based signature extraction method and a novel identification approach, based o...

Authentication, in the cloud context, is the process of validating and guaranteeing the identity of cloud service subscribers or users. It is deemed essential since its strength directly impacts the reliability and security of the cloud computing environment. Many efforts, within in the literature, have surveyed cloud security and privacy, but lack a detailed analysis of authentication for the ...