Image credit: Learning-Mind.com

Scientific studies are conducted to help solve problems and explain mysteries. It shapes the foundation for the future researchers. It is essential that these studies are valid to help researchers progress on their fields of research. However, recent analysis show that out of 100 studies in top three psychology journals, only 35 proved to be valid.

The enormous analysis was conducted by 270 researchers from five continents. The researchers did not review their own study; they worked on the original studies conducted by their co-researchers.

The analyzed studies were published in Psychological Science, the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology and the Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition.

Psychological Science is the premier outlet of all psychological studies, while the others are leading journals for cognitive psychology and social psychology.

Brian Nosek from University of Virginia and coordinator of a recent analysis explained the possibilities why a research becomes invalid and irreproducible. Nosek said, “One possibility was that I was wrong; we had a false positive. The second possibility is the replication team had a false negative. The third possibility is both are correct, but we did not recognize in doing the replication that there is an important methodological difference. It’s very difficult to distinguish between these possibilities.”

One of the studies that didn’t hold up is the research about “Freewill and cheating”, which was published in 2008. It says that people were more likely to cheat in exam if they read an essay saying that the behavior is the effect of environmental factors, and thus predetermined.

When analysts redone the study, they found that the original has weaker result. The analysts said that one possible reason is that subject’s opinion about freewill was manipulated.

In another test, analysts examined the study that says men have a harder time than women distinguishing between sexual cues versus mere friendliness while talking with a person of the opposite sex. The study was conducted by presenting facial photographs of women depicting certain emotions to men. However, when analysts conducted the study again, they found different result.

“An explanation for this lack of replication may be due to cultural differences of participants based in the USA versus the UK,” analysts explained.

Source: NYTimes.com