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Critical Essay: Meta-analysis: A critical realist critique and alternative

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Abstract

Meta-analysis has proved increasingly popular in management and organization studies as a way of combining existing empirical quantitative research to generate a statistical estimate of how strongly variables are associated. Whilst a number of studies identify technical, procedural and practical limitations of meta-analyses, none have yet tackled the meta-theoretical flaws in this approach. We deploy critical realist meta-theory to argue that the individual quantitative studies, upon which meta-analysis relies, lack explanatory power because they are rooted in quasi-empiricist meta-theory. This problem, we argue, is carried over in meta-analyses. We then propose a ‘critical realist synthesis’ as a potential alternative to the use of meta-analysis in organization studies and social science more widely.

Acceptance Date Sep 12, 2016
Publication Date Jan 1, 2017
Publicly Available Date Mar 28, 2024
Journal Human Relations
Print ISSN 0018-7267
Publisher SAGE Publications
Pages 11-39
DOI https://doi.org/10.1177/0018726716674063
Keywords Meta-analysis, meta-theory, critical realism, ontology, pistemology, aetiology,, open and closed systems, tendencies
Publisher URL https://doi.org/10.1177/0018726716674063

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