Terms and Conditions

1. Nature of the Project

The Meta-Student platform is a collaborative research initiative coordinated by the Sports Science Replication Centre. Its purpose is to pool independently collected student datasets to produce a peer-reviewed, living meta-analysis. Data submitted by participants will be aggregated with data from other contributors and analysed statistically to produce pooled effect size estimates and associated outputs.

2. Data Transfer and Storage

By submitting your dataset you consent to:

• Your data file, summary statistics, ethics approval letter, and methods report being uploaded to and stored on the Meta-Student platform servers.
• Your submitted data being retained for the duration of the project and for a minimum of 10 years after the publication of any resulting meta-analysis, in accordance with open-science and research-integrity requirements.
• Authorised platform administrators and the project coordination team being able to view your submission files for the purpose of quality review and analysis.
• Your anonymised participant-level data (with all personal identifiers removed prior to upload) being shared in an open data repository alongside any resulting publication, in line with open-science best practice.

You are responsible for ensuring all personally identifiable information is removed from your data file before submission. Participant data must be anonymised such that no individual can be identified, directly or indirectly.

3. Use in Publication

By submitting your data you explicitly consent to:

• Your dataset being included in a pooled meta-analysis that will be submitted for peer-reviewed publication in an academic journal.
• Summary statistics derived from your data (effect sizes, confidence intervals, sample characteristics) being reported in the resulting publication and any associated pre-registration, conference presentations, or supplementary materials.
• The project being pre-registered on an open registry (e.g. OSF, PROSPERO) prior to or during data collection, which may include aggregate information about the study design and expected number of contributors.

4. Authorship and Attribution

Full authorship credit is a core commitment of the Meta-Student project and a primary benefit of participation. Every contributor whose submission passes quality review and is included in the final meta-analysis will be listed as a named co-author on the resulting peer-reviewed publication.

• Your name and institutional affiliation will appear in the author list of the manuscript exactly as you provide them on the platform.
• Where a journal requires a condensed author list due to volume of contributors, a collective author name will be used (e.g. “The Meta-Student Collaboration”) with all individual names listed in full in a dedicated Contributors section or supplementary file — ensuring your contribution is formally and permanently on record.
• You will be contacted by email before the manuscript is submitted for peer review to confirm your author details, review the draft, and provide any final approval.
• Authorship is contingent on your submission being included in the analysis. Submissions that are excluded following quality review will not receive authorship credit, though contributors will be informed of the reason for exclusion.

This authorship model is what makes the Meta-Student project distinctive. By contributing rigorous, protocol-adherent data you are a genuine co-author of a peer-reviewed meta-analysis — not merely an acknowledged data donor.

5. Ethical Responsibility

You confirm that:

• Ethical approval was obtained from a recognised institutional ethics committee or review board before data collection began.
• All participants provided written informed consent prior to participating.
• Data collection was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki and your institution's ethical standards.
• The ethics approval letter you upload at submission is genuine, unaltered, and issued on official institutional headed paper with the relevant authorising signature(s).
• Submission of falsified, altered, or fabricated ethical documentation may constitute research misconduct and will result in immediate exclusion from the project and referral to your institution.

6. Data Integrity and Accuracy

You confirm that all data submitted is genuine, accurately recorded, and collected in accordance with the project protocol. Any deviations from the protocol must be documented in your methods report. Submission of fabricated or manipulated data constitutes research fraud and will be reported to your institution.

7. Right to Withdraw

You may request withdrawal of your submission prior to the data being included in a published meta-analysis by contacting the project coordinator. Once a manuscript has been accepted for publication, withdrawal may not be possible. Requests should be sent to the project coordinator with your submission ID.

8. Contact

For questions about these terms, data use, or to request withdrawal, contact:
Joe Warne — Sports Science Replication Centre