Ecological meta-analyses often produce unwarranted results.

ABSTRACT: Meta-analysis (MA), a powerful tool for synthesizing reported results, is influential in ecology. While ecologists have long been well-informed on the potential problems associated with nonindependence in experimental work (e.g., pseudoreplication), they have, until recently, largely neglected this issue in MA. However, results used in MAs are likely much more similar when they come from the same locality, system, or laboratory. A simple and common form of nonindependence in MA arises when multiple data points, that is, observed effect sizes, come from the same paper. We obtained original data from 20 published MAs, reconstructed the published analyses, and then, for 14 that had not accounted for a paper effect, used three approaches to evaluate whether within-paper nonindependence was a p

SUBMITTER: Peacor SD 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12683612 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature