economics Economics () is the social science that studies the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. Economics focuses on the behaviour and interactions of economic agents and how economies work. Microeconomics anal ...

and

social policy Social policy is a plan or action of government or institutional agencies which aim to improve or reform society. Some professionals and universities consider social policy a subset of public policy, while other practitioners characterize soci ...

, infrastructure bias is the influence of the location and availability of pre-existing

infrastructure Infrastructure is the set of facilities and systems that serve a country, city, or other area, and encompasses the services and facilities necessary for its economy, households and firms to function. Infrastructure is composed of public and priv ...

, such as roads and telecommunications facilities, on social and economic development. In

science Science is a systematic endeavor that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe. Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earliest archeological evidence ...

, infrastructure bias is the influence of existing social or scientific infrastructure on scientific observations. In astronomy and

particle physics Particle physics or high energy physics is the study of fundamental particles and forces that constitute matter and radiation. The fundamental particles in the universe are classified in the Standard Model as fermions (matter particles) an ...

, where the availability of particular kinds of telescopes or particle accelerators acts as a constraint on the types of experiments that can be done, the data that can be retrieved is biased towards that which can be obtained by the equipment. Procedural bias, related to infrastructure bias, is shown by a case of irregular genetic sampling of Bolivian wild potatoes. A 2000 report of previous studies' sampling found that 60% of samples had been taken near towns or roads, where 22% would be the average, had the samples been taken at random (or from equidistant points, or at specifically varying distances from towns, representative of the average terrain density).

References

Bias Sampling (statistics) Sampling techniques Research Infrastructure {{sci-stub