Konfidens

Konfidens is a Norwegian noun that denotes trust, reliance, or certainty in someone or something. In everyday language it can refer to the feeling that another person will act reliably or truthfully, or to a sense of self-assurance. The term is closely related to tillit and, in some contexts, to selvtillit (self-confidence). Its etymology traces to Latin confidens, passing through older Scandinavian or French adaptations.

In statistics and research, konfidens appears in terms such as konfidensnivå and konfidensintervall. A konfidensnivå is the probability that a constructed interval will contain the true parameter if the study were repeated many times; common levels are 95% or 99%. A konfidensintervall is a range estimated from the data that is believed, with a stated level of confidence, to include the parameter of interest. The concept is central to frequentist inference, and is interpreted differently from Bayesian credible intervals, which have a probability interpretation conditioned on the observed data.

In professional contexts, konfidens is also linked to konfidensialitet, the principle of keeping information confidential. Information described as konfidensielt is intended to be accessible only to authorized persons, underscoring the practical use of the concept in privacy and data protection.

See also konfidensnivå, konfidensintervall, konfidensialitet, tillit, selvtillit.