We only put up a demo version of our data tools earlier so as to get feedback before committing to larger changes.
There are some issues we want to address in the next iteration of our site:
1) We want to emphasize the context-dependence of results. The “compare programs” and “examine a program” links under the “donors” tab misleads people into thinking there is one true effect that a program is likely to have when they can access results that might be more applicable to their situation by using the “build your own meta-analysis” tool under the “meta-analysis” tab. Are there better ways of emphasizing this, apart from the warnings on the aforementioned pages?
2) We want people to be able to see the actual papers that the results are coming from more easily, especially for the meta-analysis app.
3) We would like your feedback as to what characteristics you would like to be able to filter on in the meta-analysis app (e.g. randomized, in a certain geographic area, etc.). As described there, we can’t show all the study characteristics, or the list of choices for users to make would be too long and unwieldy. To help enable better selection of characteristics for inclusion in the app, we will also look at the data to see which factors seem particularly correlated with the results of an intervention.
There are undoubtedly other things that also need improvement.
Do you have an idea as to how we can address these or other issues? Please let us know. We might be able to implement your design!
We’re asking for your help in selecting the next topics we will cover.