How to Calculate Observed Variance in a Random-Effects Meta-Analysis

[David Cregg]

I've received a revise and resubmit on a meta-analysis investigating the effects of a positive psychology intervention on depression and anxiety symptoms. I used Hedges' g as the effect size with a random effects model and the DerSimonian & Laird estimator of heterogeneity. The effect size estimates the difference between the intervention and a control group. A reviewer has asked me to report the observed variance for each meta-analysis I conduct. However, the software I'm using (OpenMEE) does not appear to report the observed variance. It calculates the individual variance for each study in the meta-analysis, but it does not provide the total variance for the meta-analysis. The results below are all the software reports. Is there a way to calculate the observed variance from the information provided in the attached output?