A follow-up Sent from my iPhone
> On Oct 21, 2017, at 12:49 PM, Christopher Green <chri...@yorku.ca> wrote: > > > > I don’t think it was a choice. I think it was a journalistic reflex — go for > the personal, the emotional, because it draws in readers. The same reason > they pepper stories about murder rates with profiles about individual murder > victims. But in this particular case, it directed readers away from the real > story. They came out feeling sympathetic with the Harvard scientist whose > work had been (correctly, let us remember) called into question instead of > gasping for air at the gaping hole that was staring them in the face. Cuddy’s > reaction might be worth a paragraph, but here we got this lavish, heroic > treatment of her hard childhood, her teenage car accident, her difficulties > returning to school, and her rise, against all odds, to a Princeton PhD and a > Harvard professorship. But that’s not the story. The story is that nearly all > of the psychological research of the past 50+ years is now under a cloud of > suspicion because we (nearly all) acted badly — sometimes disingenuously — > with respect to statistical analysis. Instead of demanding that those who > wanted the title of “scientist” really internalize the math, the probability > theory, and the critical assumption that underlie data analysis, we turned it > into a perfunctory "cookbook” that made it easy for people to think (or > rationalize) that there were no real consequences for cutting corners — > replacing butter with margarine, leaving out the dash of salt, trying to > replace sugar with some sort of artificial sweetener — and what we ended up > with was a hot mess that no one who is serious about these things can stomach > anymore. > > And it’s not as though any of this is new (though everyone who gets caught > keeps saying they had never heard of it before). The computational facility > that allows for the simulation studies of the past few years is new, but Paul > Meehl and Jacob Cohen and David Bakan, and Jum Nunnally, and Bill Rozeboom. > and Bob Rosenthal have all been telling us this stuff since the 1960s and > 1970s (and through the 1980s and 1990s). (Heck, there are even couple of > articles by a guy named Berkson from 1938 and 1942). But even most of the > psychologists who bothered to read this material (I was lucky that it was > assigned to me as an undergrad — Thanks TIPSter Stuart McKelvie!) decided to > harumph and go on pretty much as before — a little worse each decade as the > designs got more complex. > > It is a massive s#*t sandwich, and it threatens the credibility of not only > psychology, but of a ton of medical research (classic cancer experiments > aren’t replicating), not to mention the rest of the social/behavioral > sciences (every single one of which — except economics — shows an explicable > hump just inside the .05 p-value, when you survey the literature — graph > here: https://twitter.com/jtleek/status/890180014733492225). And we’re > suppose to focus on poor Amy Cuddy’s feelings? The thing is (for those of you > inclined to think that this is “really” a gender issue), Cuddy is way old > news now. Brian Wansink’s food lab at Cornell is having to correct and > retract dozens of articles — research that has already been (mis-)used to > change the practices of school cafeterias and the like. For heaven’s sake, he > was so “sloppy" that one of his most famous studies on the eating behaviour > of 8-11 year olds turned out to have actually been run on 4-5 year olds! I > wouldn't expect him or his lab to last another year. There are half a dozen > other prominent labs under scrutiny of this kind as well. > > Psychology is in deep trouble. Much worse than we know yet, especially once > the politicians who hate social science already get ahold of it. Amy Cuddy’s > feelings won’t amount to a hill of beans once the full scale of this thing is > understood. > > Chris > ….. > Christopher D Green > Department of Psychology > York University > Toronto, ON M3J 1P3 > Canada > 43.773895°, -79.503670° > > chri...@yorku.ca > http://www.yorku.ca/christo > orcid.org/0000-0002-6027-6709 > ………………………………... > >> On Oct 21, 2017, at 11:51 AM, Michael Palij <m...@nyu.edu> wrote: >> >> >> >> >> >> >> On Fri, 20 Oct 2017 20:03:43 -0700, Christopher Green wrote: >> >> >Interesting article, but I thought it made the usual journalistic error >> >of personalizing the story too much, making readers come away >> >feeling for the people instead of understanding the problem. >> >> Although I agree that there is too much personalization (I believe >> this is done so that the reader can (a) see the person described >> as more as a relatable person), and (b) borrowing some of the >> writing conventions from fiction to make what would be a dry >> nonfiction story more interesting. In an article like this, I can accept >> it. However, after a long hiatus, I am teaching Introduction to Psych >> and find that the textbook is filled with too many personalized examples >> or what I would call "cutesy" examples that to simplify the presentation >> and make it more accessible to undergraduates. I think that this >> helps students maybe to understand the presentation (or develop >> the illusion of understanding) which will be challenged when they try >> to read actual empirical research articles (e.g., "hey, where's the main >> character? Where's the dramatic action and tension? etc.). >> >> That being said, from a 'qualitative research" perspective, I think >> it is interesting to see what a person who has published a piece of >> research that cannot be replicated is feeling and thinking. Amy >> Cuddy appear to be a highly capable and skilled person who though >> she has given up on academia (at least for now) will make out >> all right (kinda like John B. Watson, if you know what I mean). >> >> The larger issue of the replication crisis, the pressures to publish >> popular (to the general public not the scientific community) articles, >> and to get external funding, I think, will be lost on the general reader. >> Seeing how these factors affect a likable character is perhaps the >> only way to show what these factors are and can do to a person. >> >> Another thing to keep in mind is that this article uses a person who >> is basically good but was incautious. It might have been more >> interesting if the person being covered was Diederik Stapel who >> seems to be a much darker person and who appears to have inentionally >> done bad things. >> >> One could say that bad science arises from good people doing >> "incompetent" research and "bad" people doing fraudulent research, >> among other things (e.g., following fads that focus on the weong things). >> >> -Mike Palij >> New York University >> m...@nyu.edu >> >> --- >> >> You are currently subscribed to tips as: chri...@yorku.ca. >> >> To unsubscribe click here: >> http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=430248.781165b5ef80a3cd2b14721caf62bd92&n=T&l=tips&o=51592 >> >> (It may be necessary to cut and paste the above URL if the line is broken) >> >> or send a blank email to >> leave-51592-430248.781165b5ef80a3cd2b14721caf62b...@fsulist.frostburg.edu >> >> >> >> >> > > --- > > You are currently subscribed to tips as: dhogb...@albion.edu. > > To unsubscribe click here: > http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13152.d92d7ec47187a662aacda2d4b4c7628e&n=T&l=tips&o=51593 > > (It may be necessary to cut and paste the above URL if the line is broken) > > or send a blank email to > leave-51593-13152.d92d7ec47187a662aacda2d4b4c76...@fsulist.frostburg.edu > --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: arch...@mail-archive.com. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=51595 or send a blank email to leave-51595-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
