背景:对被监禁人群和其他罪犯群体的研究具有挑战性,可能会阻碍研究的进行,特别是涉及复杂的研究设计,如随机对照试验和临床干预措施。提供该领域采用的研究设计的概述可以提供对该问题的见解,以及研究质量如何影响健康和司法结果。
方法:我们使用基于规则的方法从1963年至2023年之间发表的与流行病学犯罪学有关的34,481篇PubMed摘要样本中提取研究设计。将结果与公认的科学证据层次结构进行比较。
结果:我们在100份PubMed摘要的随机样本中评估了我们的方法。返回92.2%的F1分数。在34,481份研究摘要中,近40.0%(13,671)的研究设计已提取.最常见的研究设计是观察性(37.3%;5101),而试验形式的实验研究(随机,非随机)占16.9%(2319)。针对当前的科学证据等级,13.7%(1874)的提取研究设计不能被分类。在其余的研究中,大多数是观察性(17.2%;2343),其次是系统评价(10.5%;1432),随机对照试验占8.7%(1196)的研究,荟萃分析占1.4%(190)的研究.
结论:可以通过计算从大规模PubMed样本中提取流行病学研究设计。然而,试验的次数,系统评价,而荟萃分析相对较小-只有五分之一的文章。尽管文章总数随着时间的推移而增加,摘要中缺少研究设计细节.流行病学犯罪学仍然缺乏解决囚犯和罪犯边缘化和孤立人群健康需求所需的实验证据。
BACKGROUND: The challenging nature of studies with incarcerated populations and other offender groups can impede the conduct of research, particularly that involving complex study designs such as randomised control trials and clinical interventions. Providing an overview of
study designs employed in this area can offer insights into this issue and how research quality may impact on health and justice outcomes.
METHODS: We used a rule-based approach to extract
study designs from a sample of 34,481 PubMed abstracts related to epidemiological criminology published between 1963 and 2023. The results were compared against an accepted hierarchy of scientific evidence.
RESULTS: We evaluated our method in a random sample of 100 PubMed abstracts. An F1-Score of 92.2% was returned. Of 34,481
study abstracts, almost 40.0% (13,671) had an extracted
study design. The most common
study design was observational (37.3%; 5101) while experimental research in the form of trials (randomised, non-randomised) was present in 16.9% (2319). Mapped against the current hierarchy of scientific evidence, 13.7% (1874) of extracted
study designs could not be categorised. Among the remaining studies, most were observational (17.2%; 2343) followed by systematic reviews (10.5%; 1432) with randomised controlled trials accounting for 8.7% (1196) of studies and meta-analysis for 1.4% (190) of studies.
CONCLUSIONS: It is possible to extract epidemiological study designs from a large-scale PubMed sample computationally. However, the number of trials, systematic reviews, and meta-analysis is relatively small - just 1 in 5 articles. Despite an increase over time in the total number of articles, study design details in the abstracts were missing. Epidemiological criminology still lacks the experimental evidence needed to address the health needs of the marginalized and isolated population that is prisoners and offenders.