ArticlePloS one2013
Understanding of statistical terms routinely used in meta-analyses: an international survey among researchers.
Article in PloS one, 2013. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
1 citing paper in PubMed.
- Mental Health Interventions in the Workplace and Work Outcomes: A Best-Evidence Synthesis of Systematic Reviews.The international journal of occupational and environmental medicine · 2016Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectiveBiomedical literature is increasingly enriched with literature reviews and meta-analyses. We sought to assess the understanding of statistical terms routinely used in such studies, among researchers.
methodsAn online survey posing 4 clinically-oriented multiple-choice questions was conducted in an international sample of randomly selected corresponding authors of articles indexed by PubMed.
resultsA total of 315 unique complete forms were analyzed (participation rate 39.4%), mostly from Europe (48%), North America (31%), and Asia/Pacific (17%). Only 10.5% of the participants answered correctly all 4 "interpretation" questions while 9.2% answered all questions incorrectly. Regarding each question, 51.1%, 71.4%, and 40.6% of the participants correctly interpreted statistical significance of a given odds ratio, risk ratio, and weighted mean difference with 95% confidence intervals respectively, while 43.5% correctly replied that no statistical model can adjust for clinical heterogeneity. Clinicians had more correct answers than non-clinicians (mean score ± standard deviation: 2.27±1.06 versus 1.83±1.14, p<0.001); among clinicians, there was a trend towards a higher score in medical specialists (2.37±1.07 versus 2.04±1.04, p = 0.06) and a lower score in clinical laboratory specialists (1.7±0.95 versus 2.3±1.06, p = 0.08). No association was observed between the respondents' region or questionnaire completion time and participants' score.
conclusionA considerable proportion of researchers, randomly selected from a diverse international sample of biomedical scientists, misinterpreted statistical terms commonly reported in meta-analyses. Authors could be prompted to explicitly interpret their findings to prevent misunderstandings and readers are encouraged to keep up with basic biostatistics.
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Registered trials
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