SynthesisRisk analysis : an official publication of the Society for Risk Analysis2022
Taxonomies for synthesizing the evidence on communicating numbers in health: Goals, format, and structure.
Synthesis in Risk analysis : an official publication of the Society for Risk Analysis, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 22 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
22 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- The impact of different radiology report formats on patient information processing: a systematic review.European radiology · 2025Pooled it
- Enhancing Patient Understanding of Laboratory Test Results: Systematic Review of Presentation Formats and Their Impact on Perception, Decision, Action, and Memory.Journal of medical Internet research · 2024Pooled it
- Using Separate Single-Outcome Risk Presentations Instead of Integrated Multioutcome Formats Improves Comprehension in Discrete Choice Experiments.Medical decision making : an international journal of the Society for Medical Decision Making · 2024Trial
- Accurate is not enough: select formats for communicating probabilities to achieve specific outcomes.BMJ evidence-based medicine · 2026Article
- How to Report Research on the Communication of Health-Related Numbers: The Research on Communicating Numbers (ReCoN) Guidelines.Medical decision making : an international journal of the Society for Medical Decision Making · 2025Article
- Testing a Novel Design Framework for Patient-Facing Machine Learning-Based Predictions of Heart Failure Decompensation.JACC. Advances · 2025Article
- Evidence on Methods for Communicating Health-Related Probabilities: Comparing the Making Numbers Meaningful Systematic Review to the 2021 IPDAS Evidence Paper Recommendations.Medical decision making : an international journal of the Society for Medical Decision Making · 2025Article
- Laypersons' understanding of statistical concepts commonly used in prescription drug promotion: A review of the research literature.Research in social & administrative pharmacy : RSAP · 2024Article
- Visualizing machine learning-based predictions of postpartum depression risk for lay audiences.Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association : JAMIA · 2024Article
- Do you want to promote recall, perceptions, or behavior? The best data visualization depends on the communication goal.Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association : JAMIA · 2024Article
- Who needs what (features) when? Personalizing engagement with data-driven self-management to improve health equity.Journal of biomedical informatics · 2023Article
- Rural adults' perceptions of nutrition recommendations for cancer prevention: Contradictory and conflicting messages.Preventive oncology & epidemiology · 2023Article
- Designing Support to help Health Communication Professionals Convey Numbers Clearly to the Public - A Needs Assessment and Formative Usability Evaluation.AMIA ... Annual Symposium proceedings. AMIA Symposium · 2023Article
- How Point (Single-Probability) Tasks Are Affected by Probability Format, Part 1: A Making Numbers Meaningful Systematic Review.MDM policy & practiceReview
- Learning from the Past to Guide the Future of Research on Risk Communication.MDM policy & practiceArticle
- How Synthesis Tasks Are Affected by Probability Format: A Making Numbers Meaningful Systematic Review.MDM policy & practiceReview
- How to Make Sense of the Making Numbers Meaningful Systematic Review.MDM policy & practiceArticle
- How Difference Tasks Are Affected by Probability Format, Part 1: A Making Numbers Meaningful Systematic Review.MDM policy & practiceReview
- How Point (Single-Probability) Tasks Are Affected by Probability Format, Part 2: A Making Numbers Meaningful Systematic Review.MDM policy & practiceReview
- How Difference Tasks Are Affected by Probability Format, Part 2: A Making Numbers Meaningful Systematic Review.MDM policy & practiceReview
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Many people, especially those with low numeracy, are known to have difficulty interpreting and applying quantitative information to health decisions. These difficulties have resulted in a rich body of research about better ways to communicate numbers. Synthesizing this body of research into evidence-based guidance, however, is complicated by inconsistencies in research terminology and researcher goals. In this article, we introduce three taxonomies intended to systematize terminology in the literature, derived from an ongoing systematic literature review. The first taxonomy provides a systematic nomenclature for the outcome measures assessed in the studies, including perceptions, decisions, and actions. The second taxonomy is a nomenclature for the data formats assessed, including numbers (and different formats for numbers) and graphics. The third taxonomy describes the quantitative concepts being conveyed, from the simplest (a single value at a single point in time) to more complex ones (including a risk-benefit trade-off and a trend over time). Finally, we demonstrate how these three taxonomies can be used to resolve ambiguities and apparent contradictions in the literature.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
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.