ArticleCBE life sciences education2018
Students Are Rarely Independent: When, Why, and How to Use Random Effects in Discipline-Based Education Research.
Article in CBE life sciences education, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 58 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
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.
The trial behind it
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.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
58 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Meta-analysis of Gender Performance Gaps in Undergraduate Natural Science Courses.CBE life sciences education · 2021Pooled it
- Active learning narrows achievement gaps for underrepresented students in undergraduate science, technology, engineering, and math.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2020Pooled it
- Trial
- A Non-Volunteer CURE in Introductory Biology Does Not Increase Student Retention at a Regional Comprehensive University.CBE life sciences education · 2026Article
- Toward Causal Inferences in Discipline-Based Education Research: Using Regression Discontinuity Design to Understand the Effect of Classroom Interventions.CBE life sciences education · 2026Article
- Could Instructor Talk Drive CURE Effectiveness? A Comparative Study of Instructor Talk in Introductory Lab Courses.CBE life sciences education · 2026Article
- The role of intermediary representations in solving lever balance problems with different target representations and problem complexities.Frontiers in psychology · 2026Article
- Nine Undergraduate Biology Instructors Revealing their LGBTQ+ Identities in Class Resulted in Benefits for their LGBTQ+ Students and Students with Other Marginalized Identities.CBE life sciences education · 2025Article
- Grade Disparities Associated with Student Demographics in Upper-Division Biology Courses Across Multiple Institutions.CBE life sciences education · 2025Article
- Student identities predict classmate and instructor fear of negative evaluation among undergraduates in large-enrollment introductory biology courses.Journal of microbiology & biology education · 2025Article
- Community college biology students' understanding ofJournal of microbiology & biology education · 2025Article
- National randomized experimental study finds no evidence of undergraduate bias against LGB biology instructors, even in LGB-unfriendly states.Bioscience · 2025Article
- Malaria prevalence dynamics and risk covariates among children under 5 in Ghana: insights from a Bayesian multilevel approach.BMJ open · 2025Article
- An Asynchronous Chemistry-in-biology Intervention Improves Student Content Knowledge and Performance in Introductory Biology.CBE life sciences education · 2025Article
- Strategically creating maximally heterogeneous lab groups did not improve group performance in an introductory biology lab class.PloS one · 2025Article
- More than a token photo: humanizing scientists enhances student engagement.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2025Article
- Comparing Academic Performance of Elementary Education Majors in General Education Science Courses.PloS one · 2025Article
- How students taking introductory biology experience the chemistry content.Journal of microbiology & biology education · 2024Article
- Optional Exam Retakes Reduce Anxiety but may Exacerbate Score Disparities Between Students with Different Social Identities.CBE life sciences education · 2024Article
- Mind the Gap: Investigating Disaggregated Student Performance in an Upper-Division Biochemistry Course Following Team-Based Learning.CBE life sciences education · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
1 author.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Discipline-based education researchers have a natural laboratory-classrooms, programs, colleges, and universities. Studies that administer treatments to multiple sections, in multiple years, or at multiple institutions are particularly compelling for two reasons: first, the sample sizes increase, and second, the implementation of the treatments can be intentionally designed and carefully monitored, potentially negating the need for additional control variables. However, when studies are implemented in this way, the observations on students are not completely independent; rather, students are clustered in sections, terms, years, or other factors. Here, I demonstrate why this clustering can be problematic in regression analysis. Fortunately, nonindependence of sampling can often be accounted for with random effects in multilevel regression models. Using several examples, including an extended example with R code, this paper illustrates why and how to implement random effects in multilevel modeling. It also provides resources to promote implementation of analyses that control for the nonindependence inherent in many quasi-random sampling designs.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.