Mini Meta‐Analysis of Your Own Studies: Some Arguments on Why and a Primer on How
We outline the need to, and provide a guide on how to, conduct a meta‐analysis on one's own studies within a manuscript. Although conducting a “mini meta” within one's manuscript has been argued for in the past, this practice is still relatively rare and adoption is slow. We believe two deterrents are responsible. First, researchers may not think that it is legitimate to do a meta‐analysis on a small number of studies. Second, researchers may think a meta‐analysis is too complicated to do without expert knowledge or guidance. We dispel these two misconceptions by (1) offering arguments on why researchers should be encouraged to do mini metas, (2) citing previous articles that have conducted such analyses to good effect, and (3) providing a user‐friendly guide on calculating some meta‐analytic procedures that are appropriate when there are only a few studies. We provide formulas for calculating effect sizes and converting effect sizes from one metric to another (e.g., from Cohen's
d
to
r
), as well as annotated Excel spreadsheets and a step‐by‐step guide on how to conduct a simple meta‐analysis. A series of related studies can be strengthened and better understood if accompanied by a mini meta‐analysis.
No keywords indexed for this article. Browse by subject →
Michael Borenstein, Larry V. Hedges, Julian P.T. Higgins et al.
Tania B. Huedo-Medina, Julio Sánchez-Meca, Fulgencio Marín-Martínez et al.
Robert Rosenthal
Showing 50 of 53 references
Oliver Schilke, Martin Reimann · 2025
Martina Kopčanová, Luke Tait · 2024
Lea Hartwich, Maja Kutlaca · 2023
Malena M. Price, Anthony P. Zanesco · 2023
Bernard E. Whitley, Andrew Luttrell · 2022
Zixuan WANG, Mauro Manassi · 2022
Sadia Shakeel, Muhammad Majid Khan · 2021
Amishi P. Jha, Anthony P. Zanesco · 2021
Scott Clifford, GEOFFREY SHEAGLEY · 2021
Dimitra Filippou, Céline Buchs · 2021
Mollie A. Ruben, Morgan D. Stosic · 2021
Sophia Crüwell, Johnny van Doorn · 2019
Eric Shuman, Dan Johnson · 2018
William E. Davis, Roger Giner-Sorolla · 2018
- Published
- Oct 01, 2016
- Vol/Issue
- 10(10)
- Pages
- 535-549
- License
- View
You May Also Like
Tony Jung, K. A. S. Wickrama · 2007
2,561 citations
Derek D. Rucker, Kristopher J. Preacher · 2011
1,817 citations
Adrian Furnham, Steven C. Richards · 2013
1,114 citations
Matthew J. Hornsey · 2008
1,020 citations