Where does streak collide?

In the study of probability judgement, a streak is a run of consecutive like outcomes (a string of makes or misses, wins or losses), and the key question is whether such runs occur more often than chance would produce or merely seem to. Gilovich, Vallone, and Tversky's 1985 The hot hand in basketball showed that perceived shooting streaks were consistent with random sequences, exposing a widespread misperception of runs. The referent is a sequence of repeated outcomes and the belief that it signals momentum, measured against a chance baseline, a wholly different construct from a mineral's powder colour.[1]

Unit

The length and frequency of runs of like outcomes relative to chance

Recovery means

Not applicable

Measured by

Tested by comparing observed run lengths and conditional probabilities against a random (independence) baseline

In mineralogy, the streak is the colour of a mineral in powdered form, seen by dragging the specimen across an unglazed porcelain plate; because the powder colour is often more constant than the colour of the bulk crystal, streak is a reliable diagnostic property, famously separating minerals that look alike. Wang's 2025 chapter Streak of Minerals describes the test and its diagnostic use. The referent is the characteristic powder colour of a mineral, read directly off a streak plate, and it is unrelated to a run of outcomes that shares the word.[2]

Unit

The colour of a mineral's powder on an unglazed porcelain plate

Recovery means

Not applicable

Measured by

Observed directly as the colour of the mark left when a mineral is rubbed on a streak plate