Most discussions of rigor and replication focus on empirical practices (methods used to collect and analyze data). Typically overlooked is the role of conceptual practices: the methods scientists use to arrive at and articulate research hypotheses in …
Publication bias is the tendency on the parts of investigators, reviewers, and editors to submit or accept manuscripts for publication based on the direction or strength of the study findings. Much of what has been learned about publication bias …
For any given research area, one cannot tell how many studies have been conducted but never reported. The extreme view of the "file drawer problem" is that journals are filled with the 5% of the studies that show Type I errors, while the file drawers …
Because physical theories typically predict numerical values, an improvement in experimental precision reduces the tolerance range and hence increases corroborability. In most psychological research, improved power of a statistical design leads to a …
Short and rapid publication of research findings has many advantages. However, there is another side of the coin that needs careful consideration. We argue that the most dangerous aspect of a shift toward “bite-size” publishing is the relationship …
We discuss three arguments voiced by scientists who view the current outpouring of concern about replicability as overblown. The first idea is that the adoption of a low alpha level (e.g., 5%) puts reasonable bounds on the rate at which errors can …
According to a recent meta-analysis, religious priming has a positive effect on prosocial behavior (Shariff et al., 2015). We first argue that this meta-analysis suffers from a number of methodological shortcomings that limit the conclusions that can …
Psychologists must change the way they conduct and report their research—this notion has been the topic of much debate in recent years. One article recently published in Psychological Science proposing six requirements for researchers concerning data …
Science is facing a “replication crisis” in which many experimental findings cannot be replicated and are likely to be false. Does this imply that many scientific facts are false as well? To find out, we explore the process by which a claim becomes …