scholarly journals An Internal Validity Index Based on Density-Involved Distance

IEEE Access ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. 40038-40051 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lianyu Hu ◽  
Caiming Zhong
Keyword(s):  
Internal Validity ◽  
Validity Index

scholarly journals Creation and validation of a questionnaire to assess pre-conceptional health needs of women in Italy

2020 ◽  
Vol 30 (Supplement_5) ◽  
Author(s):  
A Orfino ◽  
D Zace ◽  
A M Viteritti ◽  
C de Waure ◽  
M L Di Pietro
Keyword(s):  
Young Women ◽  
Internal Validity ◽  
Healthcare Services ◽  
Access To Healthcare ◽  
Health Needs ◽  
Women Of Childbearing Age ◽  
Childbearing Age ◽  
Validity Index ◽  
Delphi Procedure ◽  
Mother And Child

Abstract Background Pre-conceptional health refers to women's conditions before pregnancy. Women's knowledge, behavior and lifestyle in this period greatly influence the health of the future mother and child. This study aimed at creating and validating a questionnaire to describe the knowledge, behaviors, health status and access to healthcare services of young women of childbearing age in Italy. Methods A systematic literature review on Scopus, PubMed and Web of Science was conducted to collect the relevant information for the questionnaire's construction. Based on the review's results, a first draft of the questionnaire was developed and, then, submitted to a panel of experts for validation through the Delphi Procedure. Twenty-one multidisciplinary experts reviewed the items for content, applicability, and rated each item in terms of validity and relevance by indicating a value from 1 to 5 on a Likert scale. Cronbach's Alpha and Internal Validity Index were calculated to verify the internal reliability and validity of content. Results After the screening process, thirty-one articles were included in the systematic review. The main results concerned knowledge on pre-conceptional health, physical, mental and social health, nutritional status, lifestyle and access to healthcare services. The first draft of the questionnaire, submitted to the experts' panel for consensus, consisted of 89 items and 13 sections. Consensus was reached after two rounds of Delphi Procedure. The final version of the questionnaire consisted of 88 items and 10 sections, reporting a Cronbach's Alpha of 0.99 and an Internal Validity Index of 0.93. Conclusions The questionnaire developed in this study is a valid tool to identify the pre-conceptional health needs of young women. The results may be used by policy makers and various guidelines concerning pre-conceptional health and for the implementation of personalized interventions, aimed to improve the health of this population. Key messages Women’s knowledge, behaviours and lifestyle in the pre-conceptional period greatly influence the health of the future mother and child. This study reports the process of creation of a questionnaire which is proved to be a valid tool to identify the pre-conceptional health needs of young women of childbearing age in Italy.

A Hybrid Validity Index to Determine K Parameter Value of k-Means Algorithm for Time Series Clustering

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-22
Author(s):  
Fatma Ozge Ozkok ◽  
Mete Celik
Keyword(s):  
Time Series ◽  
Clustering Algorithms ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Internal Validity ◽  
The Other ◽  
Sequential Data ◽  
Data Mining Technique ◽  
Validity Index ◽  
Number Of Clusters ◽  
Benchmark Datasets

Time series is a set of sequential data point in time order. The sizes and dimensions of the time series datasets are increasing day by day. Clustering is an unsupervised data mining technique that groups objects based on their similarities. It is used to analyze various datasets, such as finance, climate, and bioinformatics datasets. [Formula: see text]-means is one of the most used clustering algorithms. However, it is challenging to determine the value of [Formula: see text] parameter, which is the number of clusters. One of the most used methods to determine the number of clusters (such as [Formula: see text]) is cluster validity indexes. Several internal and external validity indexes are used to find suitable cluster numbers based on characteristics of datasets. In this study, we propose a hybrid validity index to determine the value of [Formula: see text] parameter of [Formula: see text]-means algorithm. The proposed hybrid validity index comprises four internal validity indexes, such as Dunn, Silhouette, C index, and Davies–Bouldin indexes. The proposed method was applied to nine real-life finance and benchmarks time series datasets. The financial dataset was obtained from Yahoo Finance, consisting of daily closing data of stocks. The other eight benchmark datasets were obtained from UCR time series classification archive. Experimental results showed that the proposed hybrid validity index is promising for finding the suitable number of clusters with respect to the other indexes for clustering time-series datasets.

scholarly journals Improving Prototypes Representativeness by Internal Validity Index Analysis

2021 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 4-16
Author(s):  
Alexandre Szabo ◽  
Thomaz A. Ruckl
Keyword(s):  
Internal Validity ◽  
Synthetic Dataset ◽  
Validity Index ◽  
Squared Error ◽  
Index Analysis ◽  
Error Index ◽  
Index Value

Internal validity indexes are applied to evaluate the solution of a partition, which no equally reflects the same quality for all clusters, individually, in terms of prototypes representativeness. Thus, knowing their representativeness in respective clusters, it is possible adjust them to increase the confidence in analysis of found clusters. In this sense, this paper proposes a simple and effective method to obtain the internal validity index value in every cluster in a partition, identify those with low prototypes representativeness and improve them. Experiments were carried out by sum of the squared error index, which measures the compactness of clusters. The behavior of the method was illustrated by a synthetic dataset and performed for ten datasets from the literature with k-Means algorithm. The results demonstrated its effectiveness for all experiments.

Reversion Toward the Mean Independently of Regression Toward the Mean

Methodology ◽  
2009 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-6 ◽  
Author(s):  
Merton S. Krause
Keyword(s):  
Random Error ◽  
Evaluation Studies ◽  
Internal Validity ◽  
Intervention Evaluation ◽  
Population Mean ◽  
Experimental Intervention ◽  
Sample Data ◽  
The Mean ◽  
Regression Toward The Mean

There is another important artifactual contributor to the apparent improvement of persons subjected to an experimental intervention which may be mistaken for regression toward the mean. This is the phenomenon of random error and extreme selection, which does not at all involve the population regression of posttest on pretest scores but involves a quite different and independent reversion of subjects’ scores toward the population mean. These two independent threats to the internal validity of intervention evaluation studies, however, can be detected and differentiated on the sample data of such studies.

Internal Validity of the School-Climate Bullying Survey

2008 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sharmila Bandyopadhyay ◽  
Dewey G. Cornell ◽  
Timothy R. Konold
Keyword(s):  
School Climate ◽  
Internal Validity

Evidence-Based Social Sciences: A New Emerging Field

2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 207-211
Author(s):  
Nazila Zarghi ◽  
Soheil Dastmalchian Khorasani
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Critical Appraisal ◽  
State Of The Art ◽  
Internal Validity ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
Multiple Sources ◽  
Social Settings ◽  
Research Findings ◽  
Academic Area ◽  
Different Levels

Abstract Evidence based social sciences, is one of the state-of- the-art area in this field. It is making decisions on the basis of conscientious, explicit and judicious use of the best available evidence from multiple sources. It also could be conducive to evidence based social work, i.e a kind of evidence based practice in some extent. In this new emerging field, the research findings help social workers in different levels of social sciences such as policy making, management, academic area, education, and social settings, etc.When using research in real setting, it is necessary to do critical appraisal, not only for trustingon internal validity or rigor methodology of the paper, but also for knowing in what extent research findings could be applied in real setting. Undoubtedly, the latter it is a kind of subjective judgment. As social sciences findings are highly context bound, it is necessary to pay more attention to this area. The present paper tries to introduce firstly evidence based social sciences and its importance and then propose criteria for critical appraisal of research findings for application in society.

Turkish Adaptation of Diabetic Foot Ulcer Scale–Short Form

2020 ◽  
Vol 19 (3) ◽  
pp. 269-274 ◽  
Author(s):  
İsmail Toygar ◽  
Sadık Hançerlioğlu ◽  
Selden Gül ◽  
Tülün Utku ◽  
Ilgın Yıldırım Şimşir ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Factor Analysis ◽  
Diabetic Foot ◽  
Content Validity ◽  
Short Form ◽  
University Hospital ◽  
Validity And Reliability ◽  
Turkish Version ◽  
Patient Identification ◽  
Validity Index ◽  
Content Validity Index

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the validity and reliability of the Turkish version of the Diabetic Foot Scale–Short Form (DFS-SF). The study was cross-sectional and conducted between January and October 2019 in a diabetic foot council of a university hospital. A total of 194 diabetic foot patients participated in the study. A Patient Identification Form and DFS-SF were used for data collection. Forward and backward translations were used in language validity. Expert opinions were obtained to determine the Content Validity Index. To determine construct validity, exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis were used. Cronbach’s α internal consistency coefficient, item-scale correlation, and test-retest reliability were used to evaluate reliability. It was found that Content Validity Index was 0.97 (0.86-1.00), the factor loading of scale varied from 0.378 to 0.982, Cronbach’s α value varied from 0.81 to 0.94, and item-total correlations were between 0.30 and 0.75. The Turkish version of the DFS-SF was found valid and reliable to measure the quality of life of diabetic foot patients.

Quality-of-Life Measurement in Advanced Cancer: Assessing the Individual

1999 ◽  
Vol 17 (11) ◽  
pp. 3603-3611 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dympna Waldron ◽  
Ciaran A. O'Boyle ◽  
Michael Kearney ◽  
Michael Moriarty ◽  
Desmond Carney
Keyword(s):  
Quality Of Life ◽  
Advanced Cancer ◽  
Internal Validity ◽  
Semistructured Interview ◽  
Incurable Cancer ◽  
Life Measurement ◽  
The Difference ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Very High

PURPOSE: Despite the increasing importance of assessing quality of life (QoL) in patients with advanced cancer, relatively little is known about individual patient's perceptions of the issues contributing to their QoL. The Schedule for the Evaluation of Individual Quality of Life (SEIQoL) and the shorter SEIQoL–Direct Weighting (SEIQoL-DW) assess individualized QoL using a semistructured interview technique. Here we report findings from the first administration of the SEIQoL and SEIQoL-DW to patients with advanced incurable cancer. PATIENTS AND METHODS: QoL was assessed on a single occasion using the SEIQoL and SEIQoL-DW in 80 patients with advanced incurable cancer. RESULTS: All patients were able to complete the SEIQoL-DW, and 78% completed the SEIQoL. Of a possible score of 100, the median QoL global score was as follows: SEIQoL, 61 (range, 24 to 94); SEIQoL-DW, 60.5 (range, 6 to 95). Psychometric data for SEIQoL indicated very high levels of internal consistency (median r = .90) and internal validity (median R2 = 0.88). Patients' judgments of their QoL were unique to the individual. Family concerns were almost universally rated as more important than health, the difference being significant when measured using the SEIQoL-DW (P = .002). CONCLUSION: Patients with advanced incurable cancer were very good judges of their QoL, and many patients rated their QoL as good. Judgments were highly individual, with very high levels of consistency and validity. The primacy given to health in many QoL questionnaires may be questioned in this population. The implications of these findings are discussed with regard to clinical assessment and advance directives.

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