Research-Reporting Fidelity within Dietary Weight-Loss Supplement Scientific Literature

 描述(申请人提供)：研究报告保真度是指就如何在科学论文、演讲和新闻稿中分析和呈现数据所涉及的完整性，以便我们的数据和用于生成这些数据的方法被描述得没有技巧、没有夸张，并具有足够的细节，以供其他科学家判断和复制我们的方法。目前健康研究中的一个担忧是，在许多调查领域中，研究报告的保真度受到了影响。然而，关于饮食减肥补充剂的文献可能包含一些最普遍和最严重的违规行为。作为一个大多数人都在与肥胖作斗争的国家，饮食减肥补充剂是一种流行的减肥资源。基于证据的科学和关于减肥补充剂得出的结论之间的任何差距都是生物医学研究和公共健康所关注的，因为对这些补充剂进行的研究和服用这些补充剂的人数都很多。这项建议的目的是关注两个特别的问题：(1)通常被称为“p-黑客”的现象，其定义是使用各种检验重新分析数据，直到得到低于名义阿尔法水平的p值，从而增加获得假阳性结果的机会；以及(2)元分析研究中在计算效应大小方面的常见错误。该提案旨在评估这些问题的严重性，从而为评估未来在缓解这些问题方面的进展奠定基础，并测试旨在缓解其中一个问题的教育计划。第一个目标是通过结合复杂的统计方法，如多重归因和双重抽样，以及使用众包的使用，以前所未有的规模、速度和效率来确定减肥补充剂文献中的p黑客行为的流行率。第二个目标是通过系统地审查对减肥补充剂进行的荟萃分析，确定在对减肥补充剂进行的同行评议的荟萃分析中发生效应大小估计错误的频率。第三个目标是开发和测试三个针对职业生涯早期调查人员的简短培训模块的有效性，这些模块旨在通过进行简单的随机对照试验，使用减肥补充荟萃分析来提高效应大小估计数据的重复性。这项提议旨在促进的方法进步将增强未来研究人员的技术能力，他们希望使用多重归因、双重抽样和众包来调查需要从现有科学文献中提取大量详细信息的问题。此外，该项目的成果将有助于提高膳食减肥补充剂研究的准确性和重复性，使新手、更广泛的科学界、监管机构、医疗决策者更容易获得准确的科学信息，并有助于公共卫生，以帮助正在服用或考虑服用膳食补充剂减肥的人的健康和生活质量。

 DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Research reporting fidelity refers to the integrity involved with making decisions about how to analyze and present data in scientific papers, talks, and press releases, such that our data and the methods used to generate them are described without artifice, without exaggeration, and with sufficient detail for other scientists t judge and replicate our methods. A current concern within health research is compromised research- reporting fidelity in many domains of inquiry. However, the literature on dietary weight-loss supplements may contain some of the most pervasive and egregious breaches. As a nation where the majority of individuals struggle with obesity, dietary weight-loss supplements are a popular resource used to lose weight. Any gap between evidence-based science and conclusions drawn about weight-loss supplements is of concern to biomedical research and to public health, given the number of studies conducted on these supplements and the number of persons taking such supplements. The objective of this proposal is to focus on two particular concerns: (1) a phenomenon commonly referred to as "p-hacking" defined as reanalyzing data using various tests until a p-value below the nominal alpha level is obtained, thus inflating the chances of obtaining false positive results, and (2) common errors in the calculation of effect sizes in meta-analytic research. This proposal aims to assess the magnitude of these problems, thereby laying a baseline for the evaluation of future progress in mitigating these problems, and to test an educational program to mitigate one of these problems. The first aim is to determine the prevalence of p-hacking within weight-loss supplement literature with unprecedented magnitude, speed, and efficiency by combining sophisticated statistical methods, such as multiple imputation and double sampling, as well as by employing the use of crowdsourcing. The second aim is to determine the frequency of effect size estimation errors that occur within peer-reviewed meta-analyses conducted on dietary weight-loss supplements, by systematically reviewing meta-analyses conducted on weight-loss supplements. The third aim is to develop and test the efficacy of three brief training modules for early career investigators designed to enhance effect-size estimation data reproducibility using weight-loss supplement meta-analyses, by conducting a simple randomized controlled trial. The methodological advances this proposal aims to foster will enhance the technical capabilities of future researchers who wish to employ the use of multiple imputation, double sampling, and crowdsourcing to investigate questions requiring the extraction of large amounts of detailed information from existing scientific literature. Additionally, the results obtained from this project will help improve the accuracy and reproducibility of dietary weight-loss supplement research, making accurate scientific information more accessible to the novice, the broader scientific community, regulatory agencies, medical decision makers, and for public health to help improve the health and life quality of persons taking, or considering taking, dietary supplements for weight loss.