Online Publication Date:
16 Nov 2018
“5 Tips for Understanding Data in Meta-Analyses”

Meta-analysis “is a group of statistical techniques that enable data from more than one study to be combined and analyzed as a new dataset”. As we are inundated with scientific studies of all kinds, meta-analysis can be a useful technique to better understand comparisons of findings from data. However, it can be a confusing technique at first glance, so the author has delved into five tips to better understand the conclusions from meta-analysis.
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ASN Staff
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Meta-analysis “is a group of statistical techniques that enable data from more than one study to be combined and analyzed as a new dataset”. As we are inundated with scientific studies of all kinds, meta-analysis can be a useful technique to better understand comparisons of findings from data. However, it can be a confusing technique at first glance, so the author has delved into five tips to better understand the conclusions from meta-analysis.

  1. Don’t jump to conclusions without looking carefully at the context and perspective.
  2. Don’t lose sight of what data is not in the meta-analysis.
  3. Remember to check if there are signs that the studies might be too different in some way
  4. See if one (or a few) results are carrying most of the weight
  5. Size isn’t everything – and be careful of “vote counting”.


For more information please read the full article by Hilda Bastian.

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