flynn002

I’ve blogged previously about waste in science . There are numerous studies that are completed but never see the light of day. When I wrote about this previously, I focused on issues such as reluctance of journals to publish null results , and the problem of writing up a study while applying for the next new grant . But here I want to focus on another factor: the protracted and unpredictable process of peer review that can lead to researchers to just give up on a paper. Sample Gantt chart. Source: http://www.crp.kk.usm.my/pages/jepem.htm The sample Gantt chart above nicely illustrates a typical scenario.   Let's suppose we have a postdoc with 30 months’ funding. Amazingly, she is not held up by patient recruitment issues , or ethics approvals , and everything goes according to plan, so 24 months in, she writes up the study and submits it to a journal. At the same time, she may be applying for further funding or positions. She may plan to start a family at the end of her fellowship...

The Müller-Lyer illusion: a highly reproducible effect. The central lines are the same length but the presence of the fins induces a perception that the left-hand line is longer. The debate about whether psychological research is reproducible is getting heated. In 2015, Brian Nosek and his colleagues in the Open Science Collaboration showed that they could not replicate effects for over 50 per cent of studies published in top journals. Now we have a paper by Dan Gilbert and colleagues saying that this is misleading because Nosek’s study was flawed, and actually psychology is doing fine. More specifically: “ Our analysis completely invalidates the pessimistic conclusions that many have drawn from this landmark study .” This has stimulated a set of rapid responses, mostly in the blogosphere. As Jon Sutton memorably tweeted: “I guess it's possible the paper that says the paper that says psychology is a bit shit is a bit shit is a bit shit.” So now the folks in the media are confuse...