Digital Event

Psychological science needs theory development before preregistration

“(…) a substantial proportion of research effort in experimental psychology isn’t expended directly in the explanation business; it is expended in the business of discovering and confirming effects” —Cummins (2000). I am contributing to this digital event from a theoretician’s perspective. I thought I’d be upfront about this to set the right expectations. Theoretical perspectives […]

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You must tug that thread: why treating preregistration as a gold standard might incentivize poor behavior

It is too early to know whether the recent period of methodological introspection in psychological science, and the sciences in general, will lead to positive changes in practices. As with any revolution, there is the potential of moving backward. One problem that has been consistently acknowledged is the problem of incentives: what gets one attention […]

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Preregistration of a forking path – What does it add to the garden of evidence?

Preregistration has many advantages, which have been pointed out in Steve Lindsay’s post yesterday and many other places. The most important advantage is probably that it demonstrates without doubt that the hypotheses and data-analysis path chosen for a study were not chosen in response to the data with an eye towards obtaining the desired results. […]

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Arguments for Preregistering Psychology Research

Richard Shiffrin’s 2018 PNAS article on the nature of scientific progress is beautifully written, erudite, and insightful. I learned a lot from it and agree with most of his arguments. But with the greatest respect I would like to counter Shiffrin’s expressions of doubt regarding the value of preregistering research plans. Those doubts were lightly […]

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Hippopotamus sauce or handcuffs for the Texas sharpshooter: #PSprereg digital event on preregistration

We all want to be free. Freedom of choice is perhaps one of the most foundational principles of western societies, and it can empower lives. As academics, we cherish academic freedom, and academic freedom has been called essential to democracy for very good reasons. However, no matter how enthusiastically we may endorse academic freedom, we […]

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#caninecog: Providing a permanent home for the discussion

During the last 10 days we published a series of posts that discussed the latest research on canine cognition, stimulated by a special issue of the Psychonomic Society’s journal Learning & Behavior. The digital event has now been given a permanent home at this portal, from which you can access all posts. Here is a […]

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#caninecog: Loyal to a fault–when obeying deceptive commands may be adaptive

Dogs’ undeniable loyalty to humans has allowed them to carve out a unique niche in our society, quite unlike the status of any other species. Once predominantly utilized as hunting companions and guardians, dogs are now ubiquitous in human life, offering faithful companionship and service. Thanks to their eagerness to cooperate with humans and unquestioning […]

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#caninecog: A world full of strangers—and 1 billion dogs

According to some estimates, there are about 1 billion dogs sharing Planet Earth with us. Most live in largely unrestricted conditions as village or pariah dogs, while only a small percentage of the world’s dog population live independently from humans. Most dogs have to maintain regular connections with humans to share our resources, which is […]

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Sit. Heel. Stay. Come. Help? Exploring the curious relationship with human’s best friend

Looking into the eyes of our new puppy, Kit Kat, it is hard not to feel as if she understands me. While I usually describe myself as a cat person, our family cats have never evoked the same feeling of “understanding” for me as our family dogs have, even though the cats arguably spend much […]

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