Excess significance bias in the literature on brain volume abnormalities.
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TLDR
There are too many studies with statistically significant results in the literature on brain volume abnormalities that suggest strong biases in the Literature, with selective outcome reporting and selective analyses reporting being possible explanations.Abstract:
Context Many studies report volume abnormalities in diverse brain structures in patients with various mental health conditions. Objective To evaluate whether there is evidence for an excess number of statistically significant results in studies of brain volume abnormalities that suggest the presence of bias in the literature. Data Sources PubMed (articles published from January 2006 to December 2009). Study Selection Recent meta-analyses of brain volume abnormalities in participants with various mental health conditions vs control participants with 6 or more data sets included, excluding voxel-based morphometry. Data Extraction Standardized effect sizes were extracted in each data set, and it was noted whether the results were“positive” (P Data Synthesis From 8 articles, 41 meta-analyses with 461 data sets were evaluated (median, 10 data sets per meta-analysis) pertaining to 7 conditions. Twenty-one of the 41 meta-analyses had found statistically significant associations, and 142 of 461 (31%) data sets had positive results. Even if the summary effect sizes of the meta-analyses were unbiased, the expected number of positive results would have been only 78.5 compared with the observed number of 142 (P Conclusion There are too many studies with statistically significant results in the literature on brain volume abnormalities. This pattern suggests strong biases in the literature, with selective outcome reporting and selective analyses reporting being possible explanations.read more
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Journal ArticleDOI
Bias in Peripheral Depression Biomarkers.
Andre F. Carvalho,Cristiano A. Köhler,Andre R. Brunoni,Kamilla W. Miskowiak,Nathan Herrmann,Krista L. Lanctôt,Krista L. Lanctôt,Thomas Hyphantis,João Quevedo,Brisa Simoes Fernandes,Michael Berk +10 more
TL;DR: There is an excess of studies with statistically significant results in the literature of peripheral biomarkers for MDD, suggesting the selective publication of ‘positive studies' and the selective reporting of outcomes are possible mechanisms.
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Social brain activation during mentalizing in a large autism cohort: the Longitudinal European Autism Project
Carolin Moessnang,Sarah Baumeister,Julian Tillmann,Julian Tillmann,David Goyard,Tony Charman,Sara Ambrosino,Simon Baron-Cohen,Christian F. Beckmann,Sven Bölte,Sven Bölte,Carsten Bours,Daisy Crawley,Flavio Dell'Acqua,Sarah Durston,Christine Ecker,Vincent Frouin,Hannah Hayward,Rosemary Holt,Mark H. Johnson,Emily J.H. Jones,Meng-Chuan Lai,Meng-Chuan Lai,Meng-Chuan Lai,Michael V. Lombardo,Michael V. Lombardo,Luke Mason,Marianne Oldenhinkel,Antonio M. Persico,Antonio M. Persico,Antonia San José Cáceres,Will Spooren,Eva Loth,Declan G. Murphy,Jan K. Buitelaar,Tobias Banaschewski,Daniel Brandeis,Daniel Brandeis,Heike Tost,Andreas Meyer-Lindenberg +39 more
TL;DR: This large-scale study does not support the assumption that altered social brain activation during mentalizing forms a common neural marker of ASD, at least with the paradigm the authors employed.
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Paul Klauser,Lijing Xin,Margot Fournier,Alessandra Griffa,Alessandra Griffa,Martine Cleusix,Raoul Jenni,Michel Cuenod,Rolf Gruetter,Rolf Gruetter,Patric Hagmann,Philippe Conus,Philipp S. Baumann,Kim Q. Do +13 more
TL;DR: It is suggested that NAC add-on treatment may be a safe and effective way to protect white matter integrity in early psychosis patients.
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Genetic psychophysiology: Advances, problems, and future directions
TL;DR: An overview of historical advances and the current state of genetic psychophysiology, a rapidly developing interdisciplinary research linking genetics, brain, and human behavior, is presented, discusses methodological problems, and outlines future directions of research.
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