Identifying and avoiding bias in research.
Summary of "Identifying and avoiding bias in research."
SUMMARY:
: This narrative review provides an overview on the topic of bias as part of a series of articles in Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery on evidence-based medicine. Bias can occur in the planning, data collection, analysis, and publication phases of research. Understanding research bias allows readers to critically and independently review the scientific literature and avoid treatments that are suboptimal or potentially harmful. A thorough understanding of bias and how it affects study results is essential for the practice of evidence-based medicine.
Affiliation
Ann Arbor, Mich. From the Section of Plastic Surgery, Department of Surgery, University of Michigan.
Journal Details
This article was published in the following journal.
Name: Plastic and reconstructive surgery
ISSN: 1529-4242
Pages: 619-25
Links
- PubMed Source: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20679844
- DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1097/PRS.0b013e3181de24bc
Medical and Biotech [MESH] Definitions
Publication Bias
The influence of study results on the chances of publication and the tendency of investigators, reviewers, and editors to submit or accept manuscripts for publication based on the direction or strength of the study findings. Publication bias has an impact on the interpretation of clinical trials and meta-analyses. Bias can be minimized by insistence by editors on high-quality research, thorough literature reviews, acknowledgement of conflicts of interest, modification of peer review practices, etc.
Bias (epidemiology)
Any deviation of results or inferences from the truth, or processes leading to such deviation. Bias can result from several sources: one-sided or systematic variations in measurement from the true value (systematic error); flaws in study design; deviation of inferences, interpretations, or analyses based on flawed data or data collection; etc. There is no sense of prejudice or subjectivity implied in the assessment of bias under these conditions.
Insurance Selection Bias
Adverse of favorable selection bias exhibited by insurers or enrollees resulting in disproportionate enrollment of certain groups of people.
Scientific Integrity Review
Work consisting of reports by the United States Office of Research Integrity, identifying questionable research published in articles or books. Notification of the questionable data is carried in the NIH Guide for Grants and Contracts.
Selection Bias
The introduction of error due to systematic differences in the characteristics between those selected and those not selected for a given study. In sampling bias, error is the result of failure to ensure that all members of the reference population have a known chance of selection in the sample.
PubMed Articles
Implications of m bias in epidemiologic studies: a simulation study.
Collider-stratification bias arises from conditioning on a variable (collider) which opens a path from exposure to outcome. M bias occurs when the collider-stratification bias is transmitted through a...
Attentional biases in anxiety disorders have been assessed primarily using three types of experiment: the emotional Stroop task, the probe-detection task, and variations of the visual search task. It...
Hindsight bias and causal reasoning: a minimalist approach.
What factors contribute to hindsight bias, the phenomenon whereby the known outcome of an event appears obvious only after the fact? The Causal Model Theory (CMT) of hindsight bias (Nestler et al. in...
Avoiding bias in mixed model inference for fixed effects.
Analysis of a large longitudinal study of children motivated our work. The results illustrate how accurate inference for fixed effects in a general linear mixed model depends on the covariance model s...
Attention is required for acquisition but not expression of new response biases.
Throughout a lifetime of interaction with the physical environment, people develop a strong bias to respond on the same side as the location of a target object, even when its location is irrelevant to...
Clinical Trials
Attentional Bias Modification in Patients With Posttraumatic Stress Disorder
Randomized, placebo-controlled trial of 9 sessions of computerized attentional bias training on attentional bias and on symptoms of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder.
Treatment of Social Phobia With Combined Cognitive Bias Modification and iCBT
The purpose of this study is to determine whether an internet-based treatment program, consisting of combined cognitive bias modification and cognitive behavioral therapy, reduces symptoms...
Spatial Neglect and Bias in Near and Far Space
The purpose of this research study is to learn how people distribute their visual attention when looking at objects nearby versus far away, and why vision may become distracted at near ver...
This is a study to evaluate the incidence of sampling bias during pathologic assessment of sentinel lymph nodes (SLN) when they are cut at a certain thickness (1 mm) and the tissue slices...
Computerized Information-Processing Bias Retraining in Depressed Adolescents
This study will examine how well a novel four-session computerized program, designed to help adolescents learn to interpret ambiguous situations less negatively, reduces symptoms of depres...
