Replication is key for findings based on small samples, but, as Button and colleagues note, the winner’s curse often inflates initial results and unless the replication sample is substantially better powered, the ceiling placed on average sample size likely perpetuates false positive findings until enough samples have been amassed to conduct a meta-analysis. Meta-analysis and/or integrative data analysis (Hussong, Curran, & Bauer, 2013) are particularly attractive techniques to combine data across multiple studies so that small scale research can contribute to more definitive results. In instances where that is impossible, perhaps because the sample is rare and unique, the outcome under study is highly novel or because the environmental factors have been measured using superior assessments that other studies do not include, we recommend that these studies acknowledge their limitations and present a candid account of power in the study, even if it implies that their findings might be spurious. Importantly, readers of this literature should carefully consider the caveats of such small sized studies so as not to perpetuate a series of cGxE emerging from and replicated in small samples.
