Handbook of Research Synthesis and Meta-Analysis: Third Edition

The prior editions of the Handbook of Research Synthesis and Meta-Analysis, published by RSF in 1994 (first edition) and 2009 (second edition), have played a central role in facilitating the growth of the research synthesis enterprise. The book has emphasized the need for scientific rigor in the process of summarizing and integrating the results of individual studies and illustrated how to implement that rigor and conduct reviews of the highest quality. According to Google Scholar, the two editions have been cited over 11,000 times.

While the architecture of the 2009 version of the Handbook remains current, the intervening years have seen important developments—advances in literature searching techniques, the development of machine-based abstract screening, and the increased use of meta-regression and Bayesian meta-analysis, among other factors. The integration of these developments into a third edition will lead to the continued currency of the Handbook.