An Interpretation of the Guide to the Expression of Uncertainty in Measurement

Published

May 1, 2000

Author(s)

Raghu N. Kacker

Abstract

The Guide to the Expression of Uncertainty in Measurement (GUM) is intended for all scientific and technological measurements in science, engineering, commerce, industry, and regulation. So the GUM must have a clear interpretation. But it mixes up concepts from frequentist and Bayesian statistics in ambiguous ways. Therefore, as presented, the GUM is not clear and liable to be applied in more than one way, leading to more than one way of expressing uncertainty in measurement. This paper attempts to present a clear and coherent interpretation of the GUM and proposes a simple and widely applicable approach to construct expanded uncertainty intervals. Our hope is that the clarifications and the viewpoints presented here will promote a more consistent use of the GUM and facilitate its application to situations not explicitly covered in the original document.

Citation

Special Publication (NIST SP) - 500-244

Report Number

500-244

Volume

220

NIST Pub Series

Special Publication (NIST SP)

Pub Type

NIST Pubs

Keywords

Bayesian analysis, expanded uncertainty, frequentist statistics, metrologoy, statistics, uncertainty

Citation

Kacker, R. (2000), An Interpretation of the Guide to the Expression of Uncertainty in Measurement, Special Publication (NIST SP), National Institute of Standards and Technology, Gaithersburg, MD (Accessed May 3, 2026)

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