Inappropriate choice of the experimental unit leads to a dramatic overestimation of the significance of quantitative trait loci for prepulse inhibition and startle response in recombinant congenic mice

Neuropsychopharmacology

Volumn 28, Issue 4, 2003, Pages 818-

  Palmer, Abraham A ^a   Airey, David C ^b  

^a Russ Berne Medical Science Pavilion ^*  (United States)

^b VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

ANIMAL; C57BL MOUSE; CONGENIC STRAIN; DECISION MAKING; GENETICS; METHODOLOGY; MOUSE; NOTE; QUANTITATIVE TRAIT LOCUS; STARTLE REFLEX; STATISTICS;

ANIMALS; DECISION MAKING; MICE; MICE, CONGENIC; MICE, INBRED C57BL; QUANTITATIVE TRAIT LOCI; RESEARCH DESIGN; STARTLE REACTION; STATISTICS;

EID: 0038388941     PISSN: 0893133X     EISSN: 1740634X     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1038/sj.npp.1300064     Document Type: Letter

References (4)

1. Anderson B (1990). Methodological Errors in Medical Research. Chapter 13: The Sampling Unit. Blackwell Publishers: Oxford, UK. pp 147-156.
2. Joober R, Zarate J, Rouleau G, Skamene E, Boksa, P (2002). Provisional mapping of quantitative trait loci modulating the acoustic startle response and prepulse inhibition of acoustic startle. Neuropsychopharmacology, in press (originally published online March 14, 2002, at http://www.acnp.org/citations/Npp031402268).
3. Kenny DA, Judd CM (1986). Consequences of violating the independence assumption in analysis of variance. Psychol Bull 99: 422-431.
4. Machlis L, Dodd PWD, Fentress JC (1985). The pooling fallacy: problems arising when individuals contribute more than one observation to the data set. Z Tierpsychol 68: 201-214.