Meta Synthesis and Meta Analysis in Action with R

Abstract

Meta-analysis and meta-synthesis are sophisticated statistical techniques that combine and analyze data from multiple independent studies to obtain a more comprehensive and reliable estimate of the relationship or effect size between variables. Systematic reviews provide a method for thoroughly reviewing and synthesizing findings from individual quantitative and qualitative studies to derive more reliable conclusions and comprehensive results. By integrating and analyzing a wide range of information, meta-analysis and meta-synthesis help in identifying consistent patterns. Achieving a comprehensive and adequate understanding in qualitative research is a significant goal, as it allows for the discovery of new research insights through conceptual exploration. Combining the quantitative results is also a worthy goal in finding scientific insights. Meta-analysis provides an overall effect size based on individual quantitative research studies. This phenomenon represents a research gap for a psychological sciences researcher or other researchers. This paper aims to explain the practical application of meta-synthesis and meta-analysis. The meta-analysis was illustrated with a numerical example using R 4.3.1.

Keywords

• meta synthesis
• meta-analysis
• quantitative and qualitative designs
• psychological sciences
• r