Infrastructure bias
Encyclopedia
In economics
Economics
Economics is the social science that analyzes the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. The term economics comes from the Ancient Greek from + , hence "rules of the house"...

 and social policy
Social policy
Social policy primarily refers to guidelines, principles, legislation and activities that affect the living conditions conducive to human welfare. Thus, social policy is that part of public policy that has to do with social issues...

, infrastructure bias refers to the fact that the location and availability of pre-existing infrastructure
Infrastructure
Infrastructure is basic physical and organizational structures needed for the operation of a society or enterprise, or the services and facilities necessary for an economy to function...

 such as roads and telecommunications facilities influences social and economic development.

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In science
Science
Science is a systematic enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe...

, infrastructure bias refers to the influence of existing social or scientific infrastructure on scientific observations.

In astronomy and particle physics
Particle physics
Particle physics is a branch of physics that studies the existence and interactions of particles that are the constituents of what is usually referred to as matter or radiation. In current understanding, particles are excitations of quantum fields and interact following their dynamics...

, 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 potato
Wild potato
Wild potato may refer to:* Several species belonging to the genus Solanum, such as Solanum jamesii, Solanum berthaultii, etc.* Thladiantha dubia...

es. 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).
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