Generalization

Research

How far findings extend beyond the studied sample — depends on sampling strategy and is often called external validity.

Sources

1. Merriam-Webster — generalization merriam-webster.com accessed 23 September 2026

Merriam-Webster: “the act or process of generalizing”, and “a general statement, law, principle, or proposition”. First recorded 1761. The dictionary also records the psychological sense, where a learned response extends to stimuli beyond the original. In research writing the noun does double duty — the move and its product — and criticism of “a generalization” is usually aimed at the move, not the statement.

Merriam-Webster is cited as the dictionary of record: where an entry defines a word rather than a position, a dictionary is the primary source for it. The research usage above is this lexicon’s own.

Related terms

• Abbreviation
• Abstract
• Abstraction
• Academic Database
• Analysis
• Annotation

From the AJG lexicon archive (July 2026).