SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Science is a messy, error fraught business, which is why reproducibility is so essential. Unfortunately, that doesn't appear to be one of psychology's strong suits, according to a massive analysis published yesterday in Science.
A years-long effort to reproduce more than 100 psychology studies across three leading journals paints a pretty dismal picture. When re-tested by independent research psychologists, the conclusions of more than 60 studies on personality, relationships, learning, and memory, turned out to be far less whelming. Strongly significant findings often became weaker, while weakly significant findings became non-existent.
http://gizmodo.com/a-lot-of-published-psychology-results-are-bullshit-1727228060
[Source]: The New York Times
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday August 30 2015, @05:11AM
80% of all the crap I've ever heard from psychologists is hogwash. I put as much faith in witch doctors as I do psychologists, psychiatrists, psychoanalysts.
Remember Freud and his "penis envy" theories about women? Retarded shit - and psycho "doctors" gobbled that shit up.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 30 2015, @05:14AM
But it's useful for people who want to control others. A study says violent video games make people violent? Ban violent video games! Don't even bother reporting that the study you cited that concluded that violent video games make people violent was later debunked and isn't accepted by the majority of scientists.
The media takes garbage studies and reports them in such a way that they appear even worse. They're very good at that.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by frojack on Sunday August 30 2015, @05:20AM
You forgot to toss in Chiropractors, and homeopaths.
The problem is that insurance pays for quackery, and the amount of quackery expands to consume the available funds.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 30 2015, @05:22AM
You say that now, but wait till you get a case of subluxation - you'd be calling dr. bob.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday August 30 2015, @05:24AM
I suppose that I should look up subluxation, and dr. bob, and offer some witty response.
I'll just stay out of the polluted gene pools to avoid catching it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 30 2015, @12:42PM
It's a reference to one of the few great trolls of pre-beta /.'s later years.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by caffeine on Sunday August 30 2015, @05:43AM
I read something from one of the managers of a health insurance fund in Australia a while ago that discussed this issue. They know full well that chiropractors and homeopaths are BS but offer coverage for this as it tends to attract younger members to join their fund. Their real big ticket items are knee & hip replacements and they have to keep signing up healthy young people to keep their fund viable as their member base ages. Last time I checked, in Australia the only fund that did not pay for BS was the doctors health fund.
(Score: 2) by mrchew1982 on Monday August 31 2015, @01:21AM
Chiropractors are OK for back and neck pain, or at least the good ones are. Most of the crap that they do can be accomplished with a good stretch though. The biggest problem that they all have is that they would like to think that they can cure cancer and AIDS just by waving their hands, and they preach that shite any chance that they get...
Fully agreed on homeopathy, another thing that quack chiropractors like to peddle...
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 30 2015, @06:26AM
80% of all the crap I've ever heard from psychologists is hogwash. I put as much faith in witch doctors as I do psychologists
Houston, we have a problem!
This study of the reproducibility of psychology studies was, you guessed it, conducted by psychologists!
Runaway's mind is now stuck in a recursive loop.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 30 2015, @06:34AM
Thank Bob it wasn't an infinite loop. Runaway will back to normal as soon as recursion smashes his stack.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 30 2015, @07:19AM
They say you have to hit rock bottom before you can get better.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday August 30 2015, @07:58AM
Poor child - you should read the post again. If 80% of shrink talk is bullshit, that leaves 20% which is something other than bullshit. No recursive loop here.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 30 2015, @08:37AM
Poor child - you should read the post again. If 80% of shrink talk is bullshit, that leaves 20% which is something other than bullshit. No recursive loop here.
Lol, I saw it. And yet these psychologists found substantially less than 80% was bullshit. So in the loop of cognitive dissonance you remain.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 03 2015, @01:10PM
They should check out the social 'sciences' specifically.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 04 2015, @09:30PM
These psychologists showed no such thing. This was about reproducibility. Even if a study can be reproduced, that doesn't mean it is understand why researchers are getting the result that they are. So it is still possible that their theories about why they are getting those results are nonsense.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 30 2015, @08:03AM
Houston, we have a problem!
Notice how he said "80%" and not all. Not sure where that number came from, but still.
Furthermore, generally, the more complex whatever you're studying is, the more difficult it is to study it properly. Reproducing the studies to see if you get the same result is more simple than doing original and good science in the first place, as there is less that can go wrong. That is why this is more believable than the types of studies that reach arbitrary and subjective conclusions about how violent video games make people more violent, how X makes people "callous" towards Y, etc.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Phoenix666 on Sunday August 30 2015, @11:38AM
As someone trained in the social sciences, I have on occasion thought that physical scientists rather take the easy way out in studying natural phenomena that can be pinned down, controlled, and whose behaviors can be reproduced. People are devilishly difficult to study, because they are complex and moving all the time. They're conscious, and consciously or unconsciously mess with your study. As such it's much more complex, much more multi-variate a system than what, say, chemists tackle.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Sunday August 30 2015, @12:58PM
If the "social scientists" would deal with populations on the order of 1023, I reckon the social sciences would be as accurate as chemistry (which is not that accurate as many people think, those equilibrium points for the reversible reactions are correct just statistically and, anyway, empirically determined).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Sunday August 30 2015, @02:59PM
Actually I've once heard that some chemical reactions won't work if the chemist cleans his equipment too thoroughly.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 30 2015, @01:39PM
I think Dr. Fancyfree [wikia.com] says it best regarding this entire field: I'm going to do something that goes against all my training as a therapist... I'm going to CURE you!!!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 30 2015, @04:06PM
It's complex, but that is no reason to lower our standards. Bad science is bad science. I'm not saying you were necessarily saying that, though.
(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Sunday August 30 2015, @05:17PM
Hah. Try quantum physics.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Sunday August 30 2015, @05:25PM
Touche, nerdfest.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Tuesday September 01 2015, @01:38PM
The theoretical calculations of various properties of fundamental particles have often been orders of magnitude more accurate than the observations the theories were originally based on, as evidenced by later, more accurate observations.
No one knows why.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 30 2015, @06:29PM
It is not specific to social sciences. [washingtonpost.com] There is tons of pressure to bias results in the hard sciences too.
IIRC there was a recent story about how requiring scientists to formally specify their testing regimen up front, before starting the experiment, drastically cut down the 'success rate.' The theory being that the urge to comb through the data after the fact, looking for novel results was just too strong.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Sunday August 30 2015, @12:47PM
He's trying to align more with the classics than with Sturgeon [wikipedia.org].
From the same page and as a word of caution for those disgusted by 80% crap of everything:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 30 2015, @06:50AM
Gobbled up penises did they, hmm tell me about your mother.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 30 2015, @06:54AM
Your mother wishes her clit were a dick so she could rock you up the ass.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by aristarchus on Sunday August 30 2015, @10:34AM
Sigmund Freud said that sometimes a good homoerotic fantasy was just a good homoerotic fantasy, and not a cigar, or a shoe, or a truck, or a gun, or a large comb-over, or anything else one might mistake a good homoerotic fantasy for. Oh, and the more you deny it, the more it is true. Of course, if you don't deny it, it is true any way. So basically your choice, when you attempt to take on Dragons or Shrinks.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Sunday August 30 2015, @12:38PM
And the rest of 20% crap is what? Pure crap?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Sunday August 30 2015, @05:18PM
Unproven.