[mikkergp]

How does a meta analysis of something like this avoid, I don’t know what it would be called but like regression to the mean. A “nudge” isn’t a singular thing, it’s a very diverse process requiring a competent administrator. My gut would say when you averaged all those out, you’d see no effect because your experimenting, some work some don’t work, some backfire. It seems like you’d have to do a meta analysis on a specific nudge, not on groups of nudges.

[svnt]

They aren’t summing effects. An effect is not cancelled by an inverse effect or as you put it, backfire.

The methodology should (I haven’t investigated theirs in detail) not be susceptible to this, and I doubt a mean of effects would make it through peer review for reasons including the ones you’ve mentioned.

[mikkergp]

Where are they getting an effect size of .08 if not by mathing a bunch of other effect sizes.