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Evidence Synthesis Technology

Edited by Neal R. Haddaway, Stockholm Environment Institute, Sweden

Evidence synthesis is a vital part of evidence-informed decision-making, but high growth in the volume of research evidence over recent decades has made efficient evidence synthesis increasingly challenging. As the appreciation and need for timely and rigorous evidence synthesis continue to grow, so too will the need for tools and frameworks to conduct reviews of expanding evidence bases in an efficient and time-sensitive manner. Efforts to future-proof evidence synthesis through the development of new evidence synthesis technology (ESTech) have so far been isolated across interested individuals or groups, with no concerted effort to collaborate or build communities of practice in technology production. 

Environmental Evidence Editors are proud to introduce a special series of papers on ESTech, and invite the readers of environmental evidence to submit manuscripts introducing and validating novel tools and frameworks. We hope this collection will help to consolidate ESTech development efforts and we encourage readers to join the ESTech revolution. In order to future-proof evidence synthesis against the evidence avalanche, we must support community enthusiasm for ESTech, reduce redundancy in tool design, collaborate and share capacity in tool production, and reduce inequalities in software accessibility.

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  1. One of the most important steps in the process of conducting a systematic review or map is data extraction and the production of a database of coding, metadata and study data. There are many ways to structure ...

    Authors: Neal R. Haddaway, Charles T. Gray and Matthew Grainger
    Citation: Environmental Evidence 2021 10:5
  2. Evidence synthesis is a vital part of evidence-informed decision-making, but high growth in the volume of research evidence over recent decades has made efficient evidence synthesis increasingly challenging. A...

    Authors: Neal R. Haddaway and Martin J. Westgate
    Citation: Environmental Evidence 2020 9:28
  3. Systematic mapping assesses the nature of an evidence base, answering how much evidence exists on a particular topic. Perhaps the most useful outputs of a systematic map are an interactive database of studies ...

    Authors: Neal R. Haddaway, Andrew Feierman, Matthew J. Grainger, Charles T. Gray, Ezgi Tanriver-Ayder, Sanita Dhaubanjar and Martin J. Westgate
    Citation: Environmental Evidence 2019 8:22