The Consensus Meter helps you quickly understand the overall agreement or disagreement among research findings on a given topic. It provides a visual representation of whether the research leans more toward a "Yes", "No", "Possibly", or "Unknown". This makes it easier to gauge the prevailing scientific perspective quickly.
Our AI analyzes the top 20 papers returned for your search query and categorizes their conclusions based on the claims they support. The Consensus Meter then displays these answers in a clear, easy-to-read format, highlighting only the most relevant information for your specific question.
Key points:
The Consensus Meter is powered by the most accurate results for your specific question and requires at least 5 relevant papers to display results
In the top right corner of the Consensus Meter, you'll see the number of papers that contributed to the results
In the search results, each paper used in the Consensus Meter will be tagged accordingly with "Yes", "Possibly", "No", or "Unknown".
How to use the Consensus Meter
Go to consensus.app/search/.
Sign in to your Consensus account.
Submit a "Yes" or "No" type question in the search bar.
See the Consensus Meter appear under the Summary or Pro Analysis - but when there are enough relevant results for your search.
Try these searches that trigger the Consensus Meter
Limitations
The Consensus Meter is not a perfect reflection of all the science on a topic. The Consensus Meter is powered by the 5 to 20 most relevant results found for your specific search. It will not be a perfect reflection of the complete research that exists on a topic.
The model will occasionally incorrectly classify results – we have worked hard to give our model loads and loads of examples to learn from, but it is not infallible. We show you exactly which papers are contributing to the Consensus Meter and how we classified them.
Specific nuance is missing – one of the biggest limitations–that we are currently working to address–is that this feature does not always account for details included in the original question. For instance, if you ask, “Is ibuprofen safe for adult consumption?” and the potential result reads, “We found that ibuprofen was safe and well tolerated in children,” our model may classify that result as “Yes.”
We do not have access to all research – the Consensus database includes over 200 Million peer-reviewed papers. While this represents significant coverage, we don't yet have access to all scientific papers in the world.
Troubleshooting
Q: Why isn't the Consensus Meter coming up?
A:
Ensure your search is formatted as a "Yes" or "No" question.
The Consensus Meter may not appear if there are less than 5 relevant papers returned for your search that can be classified.
Try broadening your search to get the meter to appear.
Feedback
If you see any answers that are misclassified, please let us know by either opening a support ticket in the Support Chat or sending an email to [email protected]. Please include the following two pieces of information in your feedback:
The link to your query (example: https://consensus.app/results/?q=Can%20Zinc%20help%20treat%20depression%3F&meter=on)
Tell us what was incorrect? (example: The 3rd answer, “Results show zinc is effective…” should be classified as "Yes")
Still need assistance? Contact us at [email protected] or via the Support Chat.