← All parts of this equation

Equation 12 · Part 1 · Forty Million Clicks Through One Uneven Door

Symbol sigma_Y

σY\sigma_Y
σY\sigma_Y

What this part means

the outcome’s population standard deviation.

Its job in the formula

sigmaYa_Y is a part of this expression. Its role is fixed by the surrounding article and by the operations shown in the formula.

Where the article explains it

where ρR,Y\rho_{R,Y} is the “data defect correlation” between selection and outcome across the full population, f = n/N is the sampling fraction, and σY\sigma_Y is the outcome’s population standard deviation.

The passage around this formula

where ρR,Y\rho_{R,Y} is the “data defect correlation” between selection and outcome across the full population, f = n/N is the sampling fraction, and σY\sigma_Y is the outcome’s population standard deviation. The identity’s uncomfortable lesson for any self-selected big-data project is that the error term does not shrink as n grows unless f grows with it — and for a national population sampled through a viral website, f stays vanishingly small no…

Read this part in the article →

Learn the underlying idea

A subscript is a label attached below a symbol. It often selects a time step, component, category, or member of a sequence.

Open the illustrated subscripts: which member of a family? guide →

See this notation across published equations →

Sources cited in the surrounding passage

These citations provide research context; check each source for the exact claim it supports.