An Overview of the Challenge of Publication Bias in Second Language Meta-Analysis

Meta-analysis as one of the most powerful methods in a systematic review of empirical studies has been considered in different disciplines. Regarding the increase of implementation of studies with such research design in second language acquisition research (SLAR), it is important to consider different aspects involved in the meta-analysis. Publication bias as one of the challenges which if not considered might threat reliability and validity of a meta-analytic study are the topics of many research papers. As the studies on publication bias are still developing, this topic deserves more attention to help clarification of the case. The objectives of this paper can be classified as 1) presenting the general perspective of meta-analysis and different stages of this kind of research through a practical example, 2) defining the notion of publication bias, and 3) organizing suggestions and solution regarding publication bias. This paper also considers to techniques used in meta-analytic studies for detection and reduction of publication bias. Researchers who might desire to operationalize an actual meta-analytic study in SLA might find this paper interesting and useful

Keywords:

Meta-analysis , Minimizing publication bias , Publication bias , Second language research , Systematic review