Why you should check–not just test–your statistical assumptions

Picture this. After a long and effortful process of gathering data for your latest experiment, you sit down in front of the computer, coffee in hand, ready to analyze the results. Before you dive into interpreting your analyses and seeing whether your predictions came to fruition, you decide to check the assumptions for your statistical […]

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Cognitive spendthrifts: How human biases may stem from more complicated–not simple–processing

Picture yourself sitting in front of a seemingly endless stack of exams to grade, full of open-ended questions, with responses demonstrating varying levels of understanding. Now imagine your joy when you flip open an exam with a first response that just gets it. An exceptional answer that demonstrates a true mastery of the material. Did […]

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How rats reason: A demonstration of the conjunction fallacy in a nonhuman species

Which of these is more common in the English language: A) words that end in “ing” B) words with “n” as the second to last letter? It might be tempting to pick A. There are lots of verbs that come easily to mind that end in “ing” (racing, baking, typing, etc.)—not to mention nouns like […]

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A reconsideration of reconsolidation: Theoretical concerns for applying memory research to clinical practice

There are some memories you wish you could forget. I wish I could forget the time in high school when, during the finals of a debate tournament, I accidentally spent an entire speech in front of an auditorium packed with people making arguments in favor of the opposing team’s side. While the loss of this […]

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