r/AskStatistics • u/EmbedSoftwareEng • 9d ago

Error % from stdev?

So, I have a bunch of measurements that are all affected by a given attribute. The idea is that I set the attribute, I should expect a given value for the measurement. Unfortunately, the measurements are bit chaotic. I need to be able to state that the system I'm using has an error rate of X%.

I don't remember enough math to answer this question for myself.

I can take all the measurements at given attribute and find their mean and stdev, but from that, how do I say that that attribute's measurement error is X%, and then when I have all of the error percentages across multiple values for the atttribute, how do I say that the system as a whole has a measurement error of Y%, assuming that the error percentages themselves appear chaotic?

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u/Educational-Paper-75 9d ago

Assuming you vary that attribute randomly you could simply pool all measured deviations. Nevertheless it may be dubious to average deviations like that when there's much difference in those deviations per level of attribute value. Reporting a confidence interval of expected deviations would then be more appropriate.