The evolution and adaptation of evidence synthesis during the COVID-19 pandemic in Canada: Perspectives of evidence synthesis producers.

The demand for evidence syntheses to inform urgent decision-making surged during the pandemic. The challenging circumstances of the pandemic created significant hurdles for both those requesting and creating evidence syntheses, leading to the refinement and adjustment of evidence synthesis practices. This research sought to capture and explore how the field of evidence synthesis evolved and adapted during the pandemic from the perspective of those who produced evidence syntheses in Canada.

How well do covariates perform when adjusting for sampling bias in online COVID-19 research? Insights from multiverse analyses.

COVID-19 research has relied heavily on convenience-based samples, which-though often necessary-are susceptible to important sampling biases. We begin with a theoretical overview and introduction to the dynamics that underlie sampling bias. We then empirically examine sampling bias in online COVID-19 surveys and evaluate the degree to which common statistical adjustments for demographic covariates successfully attenuate such bias.

Prospective sampling bias in COVID-19 recruitment methods: experimental evidence from a national randomized survey testing recruitment materials.

Background: In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, social science research has required recruiting many prospective participants. Many researchers have explicitly taken advantage of widespread public interest in COVID-19 to advertise their studies. Leveraging this interest, however, risks creating unrepresentative samples due to differential interest in the topic.

"Until I Know It's Safe for Me": The Role of Timing in COVID-19 Vaccine Decision-Making and Vaccine Hesitancy.

Managing the COVID-19 pandemic-and other communicable diseases-involves broad societal uptake of vaccines. As has been demonstrated, however, vaccine uptake is often uneven and incomplete across populations. This is a substantial challenge that must be addressed by public health efforts.

Supporting Scientific Advice through a Boundary Organization.

The complex socio-environmental issues faced by society - including climate change, resource management, and fostering resiliency in landscapes that intermix human and natural features - are difficult challenges that demand contextually appropriate evidence-based interventions. Institutional arrangements for providing scientific advice range from individual science advisors to large scientific committees or advisory councils, with a great deal of variation in their formal and informal structures. Regardless of the structuring of advisors, however, these arrangements face a common challenge: being required to speak to a wide range of issues in a time-sensitive manner, each of which has extensive stakeholder communities, deep disciplinary knowledge, and many complicating attributes.