The importance of pilot studies

Teijlingen, Edwin van; Hundley, Vanora

doi:10.7748/ns2002.06.16.40.33.c3214

Cited by 472 publications

(270 citation statements)

References 2 publications

(2 reference statements)

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“…3,4 Pilot studies are the primary source of information for power calculations, giving information on variable distributions and effect sizes. 5,6 A pilot of 20 samples has been suggested as sufficient to perform robust power analysis. 7,8,9 The protocol used in the pilot and main studies should be identical.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Power Analysis and Sample Size Determination in Metabolic Phenotyping

et al. 2016

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Estimation of statistical power and sample size is a key aspect of experimental design.However, in metabolic phenotyping, there is currently no accepted approach for these tasks, in large part due to the unknown nature of the expected effect. In such hypothesis free science, neither the number or class of important analytes, nor the effect size are known a priori. We introduce a new approach, based on multivariate simulation, which deals effectively with the highly correlated structure and high-dimensionality of metabolic phenotyping data. First, a large data set is simulated based on the characteristics of a pilot study investigating a given biomedical issue. An effect of a given size, corresponding either to a discrete (classification) or continuous (regression) outcome is then added. Different sample sizes are modeled by randomly selecting data sets of various sizes from the simulated data.We investigate different methods for effect detection, including univariate and multivariate techniques. Our framework allows us to investigate the complex relationship between sample size, power and effect size for real multivariate data sets. elegans.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Power Analysis and Sample Size Determination in Metabolic Phenotyping

et al. 2016

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“…The main functions of the pilot study were to test the adequacy of the research tools, assess the feasibility for the study, establish whether the technique was effective, identify logistical problems with recruitment, and variability in outcomes to help determine sample size. (62) There is however limitations to pilot studies in that they do provide some indication to the likely sample size of the main study, but cannot guarantee this; due to being based on small numbers. A further limitation is the contamination of data that can occur if pilot study data is incorporated into main study data.…”

Section: Assessment Of Dietary Intakementioning

confidence: 99%

Antioxidant intake in paediatric oncology patients

2015

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“…3 Although the 1, 195 censored posts do not amount to an overwhelming quantity of data to handle, especially when compared with existing studies on censorship (Bamman et al, 2012;Fu et al, 2013;King et al, 2013;Zhu et al, 2012), it is still advisable to conduct a pilot study, a mini-version of the full-scale study (Teijlingen & Vanora Hundley, 2002), to test the coding schedule and coding manual and to test the feasibility of the research design being used before conducting a full-scale study.…”

Section: Content Analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In addition, Teijlingen and Vanora Hundley (2002) believed that pilot studies are a crucial element of good study design that provides valuable insights for researchers to evaluate the feasibility of the variables being accounted for. Th e sample size of a pilot study is generally Article: Hong Kong protests Jingyi Zhao set to be ten percent of the total sample required for a full study (Hertzog, 2008).…”

Section: Pilot Studymentioning

confidence: 99%