Abstract
In this meta-analysis, we examined interrelationships between characteristics of infant event-related potential (ERP) studies and their attrition rates. One-hundred and forty-nine published studies provided information on 314 experimental groups of which 181 provided data on attrition. A random effects meta-analysis revealed a high average attrition rate of 49.2%. Additionally, we used meta-regression for 178 groups with attrition data to analyze which variables best explained attrition variance. Our main findings were that the nature of the stimuli—visual, auditory, or combined as well as if stimuli were animated—influenced exclusion rates from the final analysis and that infant age did not alter attrition rates.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
We thank all the authors of the research articles used in this meta-analysis for providing us with as much detail as possible, and especially those who provided us with additional information for the extra effort that they took.
Manuela Stets was funded by a ONE Northeast Studentship.