Social scientists do actual peer-review and find 60% of social science results exaggerated
Re: Social scientists do actual peer-review and find 60% of social science results exaggerated
I would have thought the figure would be even higher.
Re: Social scientists do actual peer-review and find 60% of social science results exaggerated
Lies, damn lies, and sociology.
Re: Social scientists do actual peer-review and find 60% of social science results exaggerated
It's not surprising given the subject and the difficulty of these types of studies.
Re: Social scientists do actual peer-review and find 60% of social science results exaggerated
Reminds me of that line, "any field with the word 'science' in its name is guaranteed not to be a science."
Which I think I got from An Introduction to General Systems Thinking.
Which I think I got from An Introduction to General Systems Thinking.
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Re: Social scientists do actual peer-review and find 60% of social science results exaggerated
A bit like any country with democratic in the name isn't democratic.
Re: Social scientists do actual peer-review and find 60% of social science results exaggerated
The biggest scourge in the sciences remains the data that doesn't get published because it contradicts the findings expected or preferred. This is a huge problem and always will be. It takes a special person to throw their life and soul into a piece of research, get one or two outliers which destroy the credibility of your findings and be completely honest in your papers. There is also selection bias from the publishers that means failed research doesn't get published nearly as often as it should. In reality a failed paper is just important as success as they are lessons learnt. The reason that data or failed research is omitted is partly due to the way that science is funded. You don't get research grants for failing to draw reliable results, so there's pressure to perform and produce findings with substance.
Re: Social scientists do actual peer-review and find 60% of social science results exaggerated
Lol at the Futurama reference.
I think there are two lessons here.
First, just because something is justified with numbers and a study does not mean it is true. The human condition is particularly complicated, so "proving" things is a shaky exercise.
Second, the root cause here is not the field being studied but the effect of outside human influence and confirmation bias. One should be careful not to believe this problem is isolated to the social sciences.
I think there are two lessons here.
First, just because something is justified with numbers and a study does not mean it is true. The human condition is particularly complicated, so "proving" things is a shaky exercise.
Second, the root cause here is not the field being studied but the effect of outside human influence and confirmation bias. One should be careful not to believe this problem is isolated to the social sciences.
Re: Social scientists do actual peer-review and find 60% of social science results exaggerated
Here's a timely article and podcast addressing some of these issues:
http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/podc ... r-science/
http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/podc ... r-science/
Re: Social scientists do actual peer-review and find 60% of social science results exaggerated
Vox interviewed the guy in charge of the Reproducability Project responsible for this study.
http://www.vox.com/2015/8/27/9212161/ps ... eplication
Accurate replication is the problem. He says it is difficult to follow the original methods. So, it seems, this social science result is exaggerated.
http://www.vox.com/2015/8/27/9212161/ps ... eplication
Accurate replication is the problem. He says it is difficult to follow the original methods. So, it seems, this social science result is exaggerated.