Epidemiological Practices in Research on Small Effects [Paperback]

Epidemiology faces its limits: the search for subtle links between diet, lifestyle, or environmental factors and disease is an unending source of fear - but often yields little certainty. Studies on weak associations - or small effects - often produce contradictory results which confuse the public. In this book, numerous contributions and illustrated examples show the effects of this problem, and sets out how future research should be approached in order to minimize the problems, thus producing clear results of significance.Epidemiology faces its limits: the search for subtle links between diet, lifestyle, or environmental factors and disease is an unending source of fear - but often yields little certainty. Studies on weak associations - or small effects - often produce contradictory results which confuse the public. In this book, numerous contributions and illustrated examples show the effects of this problem, and sets out how future research should be approached in order to minimize the problems, thus producing clear results of significance.Small effects as a main problem in epidemiology.- Obstacles in evaluating small effects.- Towards good epidemiological practices.- Problems in detecting small effects in case-control and cohort studies.- Proposals and recommendations concerning small effects in case-control and cohort studies.- Comments on problems with small effects in case-control and cohort studies.- Small effects and the selection of study participants in case-control and cohort studies.- Commentary on small effects and the selection of study participants in case-control and cohort studies.- Confounding: Its role in weak associations.- Commentary on confounding: Examples of its influence in weak associations.- Bias in observational studies.- Research strategies for assessing epidemiolgic associations, in relation to the distribution and measurement of exposures.- Commentary on Bias in observational studies.- Small effects: Subgroup analysis and interactil³ª