The use of meta-analysis in psychological research is very common. It is because you might not have correct results with a single study and you need larger sample sizes to get reliable results in psychology. That is why; meta-analysis is very useful in the field of psychology. It can give you integrated results of multiple studies in a single study. This can save a lot of time for other psychology researchers who are looking for meaningful outcomes on a topic. This means this type of analysis is highly significant in the field of psychology. This article will explain the application and examples of meta-analysis in psychological research.
What Is Meta-Analysis?
A meta-analysis is actually a study of past research. You can get integrated results with the help of meta-analysis. In this, you will review studies on a topic that are previously published and then you will analyze the results to find the trends in these studies. It is widely used in psychological research.
New studies are continuously being published all over the world. Because of this, the amount of studies and research is huge that you cannot study all of them. It is true even for experienced practitioners. However, with the help of meta-analysis, you can summarize the findings of all this research in a concise manner. There are a few principles in meta-analysis:
- It is done systematically
- Meta-analysis follows certain criteria
- It contains many results
- It is a quantitative study
Because it is a quantitative study, you will use statistical techniques and mathematical approaches to understand, model and measure the various aspects of human behaviour. There are a lot of limitations in a single study. With the help of meta-analysis in psychological research, you can have better results which can help you better understand the magnitude of effects and psychological behaviour.
A meta-analysis gives important trends and conclusions which can impact future research, the decisions of policymakers and the care given to the patients. If you are facing any difficulty in doing such research then you can look for PhD Dissertation Help.
Purpose of a Meta-Analysis:
There are many important objectives of meta-analysis in addition to analyzing and summarizing the result of other studies. In psychological research, you use this analysis for the purpose of:
- Evaluating the impacts in multiple subsets of participants
- Creating new hypotheses to encourage further research
- Overcoming the limitations in other studies
- Establishing statistical significance
Application of meta-analysis:
Increasing Sample Size:
The sample size is a huge issue in psychological research. Because of this, meta-analysis is very useful as it enhances the sample sizes. In order to use a large sample size, you need resources like high funds and more personnel. In a small size, you cannot study a significant number of subjects. This can create huge difficulties in drawing valid and reliable conclusions. Meta-research can help you to overcome the problem of small sample sizes as they review several types of research for the same subject area, making a large sample size. In this way, you can have a more reliable conclusion on a particular subject area.
Establishing Statistical Significance:
This analysis can also help you create statistical significance across the studies that may seem to have conflicting outcomes. By taking into consideration many studies at once, you can be able to achieve a statistical significance higher than you can achieve with a single study alone. It is important because statistical importance can increase the validity of differences observed in studies. This will also increase the reliability of the information that you provide in your analysis. Because of the greater statistical power, you can have more ability to explore the greater population.
Evidence-based:
Meta-analysis in psychological research is highly evidence-based research. You are more likely to observe an impact with proper evidence because of the combination of smaller studies into one large study. This one large study will be more accurate than the smaller studies as it includes evidence from multiple places to prove a point. This can make meta-analysis highly beneficial for psychological study.
Efficiency:
Meta-analysis is more efficient. It is because, in this research, you will be able to collect a large amount of data without spending a lot of resources, money and time. It is because the main task of the data collection process has already been done by previous research. This can highly help the research to increase the efficiency of analysis.
Gives direction for future research:
This type of analysis gives a proper view of research work which has already been done in many studies. In this way, it will integrate and summarize the results of different studies and gives useful directions for future research.
Help people in research:
This type of analysis can help people in psychological research to study a particular topic. With the help of meta-analysis, the amount of work to study a particular topic can be reduced for other researchers. You do not need to look into multiple results of many different studies. Instead, you can get more accurate analysis and results by just looking at the findings of a meta-analysis on a particular subject. This can help you better understand what is happening in a certain population.
Examples of Meta-Analysis in Psychology:
It could be useful to look at how meta-analysis can be used in psychological research. For instance, take an example of small research which shows that eating sugar before going to an exam can decrease performance in the exam. The results of this study would imply that you should avoid consuming sugar before doing the exam. However, meta-analysis can help demonstrate the previous study as an outlier. It is because it involves looking into the data related to eating behaviour and related test results.
Conclusion:
The above guide has shown you the application of meta-analysis with examples in psychological research. It can help you show the errors in previous studies and draw meaningful conclusions. With the help of meta-analysis, the statistical significance of research can highly increase. This makes this analysis highly significant in the field of psychology.
