Fixed Effects and Variance Components Estimation in Three-Level Meta-Analysis

43 Pages Posted: 9 May 2011

See all articles by Spyros Konstantopoulos

Spyros Konstantopoulos

Boston College; IZA Institute of Labor Economics

Abstract

Meta-analytic methods have been widely applied to education, medicine, and the social sciences. Much of meta-analytic data are hierarchically structured since effect size estimates are nested within studies, and in turn studies can be nested within level-3 units such as laboratories or investigators, and so forth. Thus, multilevel models are a natural framework for analyzing meta-analytic data. This paper discusses the application of a Fisher scoring method in two- and three-level meta-analysis that takes into account random variation at the second and at the third levels. The usefulness of the model is demonstrated using data that provide information about school calendar types. SAS proc mixed and HLM can be used to compute the estimates of fixed effects and variance components.

Keywords: meta-analysis, multilevel models, random effects

JEL Classification: C00

Suggested Citation

Konstantopoulos, Spyros, Fixed Effects and Variance Components Estimation in Three-Level Meta-Analysis. IZA Discussion Paper No. 5678, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1835317 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1835317

Spyros Konstantopoulos (Contact Author)

Boston College ( email )

140 Commonwealth Avenue
Chestnut Hill, MA 02467
United States

IZA Institute of Labor Economics

P.O. Box 7240
Bonn, D-53072
Germany

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