April 2025 I Course I Cesab I Autres sujets
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[FRB-CESAB] Biodiversity knowledge synthesis: an introduction to meta-analyses and systematic reviews – 2025
Pre-registrations are now open (in French)!
To pre-register, fill in the form at the end of the page. Beware, the number of places being limited, successful applications will be confirmed in June.
The CESAB – Centre for Biodiversity Synthesis and Analysis – of the FRB is offering the fourth edition of the following training course: “Biodiversity knowledge synthesis: an introduction to meta-analyses and systematic reviews“. This five-day training aims to equip researchers with techniques for conducting meta-analyses and systematic reviews/maps in the field of biodiversity. Participants will also become familiar with key tools (Web of Science, Scopus, Zotero, etc.) and statistical methods (R packages: metaDigitise, metafor, etc.) necessary to undertake systematic reviews and/or meta-analyses.
Strong proficiency in R is required, but prior experience in meta-analyses or systematic reviews is not necessary.
The training course will be given in French and will take place from October 6 to October 10th 2025 at CESAB, in Montpellier. The price will be 250 € for the week, including lunch. Participants will be responsible for their own travel, accommodation, and evening meals.
Find more about the course on GitHub
The FRB offers 4 scholarships of 250 euros each, which will cover the full registration fees. These scholarships are intended to support individuals who do not receive any institutional support (e.g., funding from their laboratory, research team, etc.) and who are unable to cover the registration fees with their own funds. We fully trust each applicant to assess their situation and apply for a scholarship only if necessary. The selection of participants will be carried out independently of the scholarship applications. Once this selection is made, the scholarships will be awarded by a random draw among the selected participants who have expressed a need for financial assistance (4 scholarships).
List of organisers (in alphabetical order):
- Damien BEILLOUIN (Cirad – Hortys) : O, S
- Jonathan BONFANTI (Inrae – Eco&Sols) : O
- Sylvie CAMPAGNE (EIFER – European Institute for Energy Research) : O, S
- Nicolas CASAJUS (FRB-Cesab) : O, S
- Frédéric GOSSELIN (INRAE) : O
- Joseph LANGRIDGE (FRB-Cesab) : O, S
- Dakis-Yaoba OUEDRAOGO (Experte indépendante) : O, S
- Cathleen PETIT (FRB-Cesab) : O,S
- Romain SORDELLO (PatriNat) : O, S
- Lea TERRAY (PatriNat) : O, S
- Devi VEYTIA (FRB-Cesab) : O, S
This list includes the people who contributed to the organisation of the training course (O) and the speakers in 2024 (S).
PRACTICAL INFORMATION
Workshop: October 6 – 10 2025
- Pre-registration opening
April 7th 2025
- Pre-registration closure
May 16th 2025, midnight (CEST)
- Registration confirmation
June 2025
CESAB – FRB
5, rue de l’École de médecine
34000 Montpellier
Pre-programme
Monday, October 6, 2025:
– Welcome and introduction to the training week
– Introduction to knowledge synthesis
– Systematic review protocol
– Importance of stakeholder involvement
– Systematic literature search: databases and search equation formulation (PECO/PICO approach)
– Building and cleaning the study corpus
– Systematic sorting of articles: Sorting by title, abstract, and full text. Importance of eligibility criteria.
Tuesday, October 7, 2025:
– [ENG] Introduction to automated screening techniques / AI-assisted screening : based on titles and abstracts
– Reporting
– Manual approach: Introduction to systematic maps and metadata extraction (“coding”). What data should be extracted for systematic maps?
– [ENG] Machine Learning approach: Extraction and categorization of qualitative information/data.
– Qualitative synthesis and visualization of (meta-)data
Wednesday, October 8, 2025:
– Critical appraisal: understanding its importance and implementation
– Introduction to quantitative approaches: effect sizes, Hedges’ d/g, odds ratios
– Extraction of quantitative data: available tools (R packages: metaDigitise, PlotDigitizer, etc.)
– Quantitative synthesis: data visualization (forest plots)
– Risk of bias and interpretation of meta-analysis result
Thursday, October 9, 2025:
– Group projects: Hands-on session to consolidate learning
Friday, October 10, 2025:
– Presentation of group projects
Pre-registration form (in French)
CO-ORGANISER
