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[1] [2] The confidence level, degree of confidence or confidence coefficient represents the long-run proportion of CIs (at the given confidence level) that theoretically contain the true value of the parameter; this is tantamount to the nominal coverage probability. For example, out of all intervals computed at the 95% level, 95% of them should ...
In statistics, the 68–95–99.7 rule, also known as the empirical rule, and sometimes abbreviated 3sr, is a shorthand used to remember the percentage of values that lie within an interval estimate in a normal distribution: approximately 68%, 95%, and 99.7% of the values lie within one, two, and three standard deviations of the mean, respectively.
For a confidence level, there is a corresponding confidence interval about the mean , that is, the interval [, +] within which values of should fall with probability . Precise values of z γ {\displaystyle z_{\gamma }} are given by the quantile function of the normal distribution (which the 68–95–99.7 rule approximates).
gives 95.000% level of confidence 95 percent 2.0000 gives 95.450% level of confidence Two std dev 2.5759 gives 99.000% level of confidence "Two nines" 3.0000 gives 99.730% level of confidence Three std dev 3.2905 gives 99.900% level of confidence "Three nines" 3.8906 gives 99.990% level of confidence "Four nines" 4.0000
By a similar argument, the numerator values of 3.51, 4.61, and 5.3 may be used for the 97%, 99%, and 99.5% confidence intervals, respectively, and in general the upper end of the confidence interval can be given as (), where is the desired confidence level.
The dependence of the confidence intervals on sample size is further illustrated below. For N = 10, the 95% confidence interval is approximately ±13.5789 standard deviations. For N = 100 the 95% confidence interval is approximately ±4.9595 standard deviations; the 99% confidence interval is approximately ±140.0 standard deviations.
The commonly used approximate value of 1.96 is therefore accurate to better than one part in 50,000, which is more than adequate for applied work. Some people even use the value of 2 in the place of 1.96, reporting a 95.4% confidence interval as a 95% confidence interval. This is not recommended but is occasionally seen. [15]
± % at 95% confidence is always ± % at 99% confidence for a normally distributed population. The smaller the estimated error, the larger the required sample, at a given confidence level; for example, at 95.4% confidence: ±1% would require 10,000 people. ±2% would require 2,500 people.