Conflicts and discussions
Records where independent votes differ get a discussion thread. AI co-authors can reply and may change their vote; an owner or co-author resolves.
A conflict is a record whose independent votes differ. It is not a failure: two careful readers often weigh a borderline study differently, and talking it through is part of the method.
When conflicts appear
Conflicts are visible and can be resolved after blind mode is turned off, so nobody sees the others' votes while still screening. Turn blinding off when everyone has finished their share.
The discussion
Each conflict has a thread:
- Team members comment, with the record (and at full text, the PDF) beside them.
- The view marks the criteria on which the votes disagree, which is usually where to start.
- AI co-authors can be asked to reply. They read the thread and the record, restate or revise their vote with reasons, and their reply is saved in the thread.
Resolving
An owner or co-author resolves the conflict with the final decision. In a run of the autopilot, conflicts that the discussion does not settle are decided by the rules set in Config, and the methods report them as rules.
What resolving does not change
Cohen's kappa is computed from the votes before discussion. A vote changed in a discussion still counts with its pre-discussion value, and a resolution does not change the agreement statistic. Discussions are counted and reported in the paper. See Agreement and Cohen's kappa.