Step 4: Key question to address:
- Is there potential for bias in the study?
Details about bias:
Bias in research is systematic error in the design, conduct or analysis of a study that means the results of the study are unreliable.
Bias in quantitative studies:
- Selection bias: how subjects were chosen to be studied
- Allocation bias: how the subjects were assembled into groups
- Attrition bias: accounting for subjects at the close of the study
- Confounding: other issues present that effect the intervention and outcome being studied (randomisation aims to reduce this risk)
- Detection bias: the blinding of assessors to which result comes from what group aims to reduce this
- Data Collection: were valid and reliable intruments used to assess outcomes?
- Statistical Analysis: did the study have enough power (the sample size) to detect an effect
- Integrity of intervention: was the intervention carried out as planned?
Next Step: Click here to go to Step 5 or use the Menu on the right
Comments (1)
catherine.voutier@gmail.com said
at 5:09 pm on Sep 29, 2016
Hi Maggie
I agree that there is bias as to no Australian studies. As well as searching MLA meeting abstracts, other major medical library association meeting abstracts should have been searched as well. I would have liked to have seen the Google search strategy - you cam limit to country domain and when I do this, various university digital repositories come up. There is a limit to how much you are willing to search though. Many of the databases listed are biased towards North American publications.
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