Hi, wholegrain,
I think spaced_man's position is sound. He addressed your original objection in his second post, showing that your author did in fact mean to present a "meta-analysis," in which the "analyses were analyzed," so to speak.
That alone would suffice to justify the singular/plural usage which troubles you. Still, I think your author invites confusion.
I continue in my position that this sort of number mixing is not unusual, even without the "meta-" thing. I'm dragging my feet on checking your "donkey" reference, knowing the role the donkey plays in begetting the jackass. I'll get caught up eventually.
I need to sort out the grammar in the following usage:
The pharmacist compounded ten different preparations, using the correct formula/formulae in each and every case.
- - - in each case.
- - - in every case.
I'm not sure about the rules of agreement in cases like this.
I find a few scattered grammatical errors in the excerpt, as does spaced_man, but I'd prefer to stick to one issue at a time.
The meaning seems clear enough: He thinks there should be consistency in adjusting for "confounders," but on the other hand he doesn't see a pattern of errors where this has not been done.
- A.
Edit. Okay, I looked at the donkey stuff. While spaced_man's approach is straightforward and simple, the approach I had been taking does seem to evoke the donkey issues. His is better.
Just between you and me, I think the donkey stuff would be better addressed in the Linguistics Forum.