Effect of Population Heterogenization on the Reproducibility of Mouse Behavior: A Multi-Laboratory Study
Figure 5
Variation of strain main effects across the six laboratories in both designs.
For each laboratory and experimental design, the main effect of ‘strain’ was separately calculated and displayed in terms of the mean F-ratio (+ s.e.m., square-root-transformed) across all 29 behavioral measures. Although the strain effect varied considerably among laboratories in the heterogenized design, the standardized design produced even more variable outcomes. Moreover, average F-ratios for ‘strain’ were considerably higher in the standardized design, indicating that treatment effects may be systematically overestimated by standardization.