Promoting Open Science to Increase the Trustworthiness of Evidence in Special Education

Scientific evidence should guide the selection of practice for individuals with disabilities. Scientific evidence, however, must be trustworthy to move special education toward greater empirical certainty and more effective policies and practices. Transparency, openness, and reproducibility increase the trustworthiness of evidence. We propose that researchers in special education adopt emerging open-science reforms, such as preprints, data and materials sharing, preregistration of studies and analysis plans, and Registered Reports. Adoption of these practices will require shifts in cultural norms, guidelines, and incentives. We discuss how adopting open-science practices can advance the quality of research and, consequently, policy and practice in special education.

Download Full-text

Open Science Saves Lives: Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic

10.1101/2020.08.13.249847 ◽

2020 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Lonni Besançon ◽

Nathan Peiffer-Smadja ◽

Corentin Segalas ◽

Haiting Jiang ◽

Paola Masuzzo ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Research Output ◽

Open Science ◽

Scientific Process ◽

Science Practices ◽

Link Type ◽

Research Communities ◽

Research Findings ◽

Potential Impact ◽

Quality Of Research

AbstractIn the last decade Open Science principles have been successfully advocated for and are being slowly adopted in different research communities. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic many publishers and researchers have sped up their adoption of Open Science practices, sometimes embracing them fully and sometimes partially or in a sub-optimal manner. In this article, we express concerns about the violation of some of the Open Science principles and its potential impact on the quality of research output. We provide evidence of the misuses of these principles at different stages of the scientific process. We call for a wider adoption of Open Science practices in the hope that this work will encourage a broader endorsement of Open Science principles and serve as a reminder that science should always be a rigorous process, reliable and transparent, especially in the context of a pandemic where research findings are being translated into practice even more rapidly. We provide all data and scripts at https://osf.io/renxy/.

Download Full-text

Open science saves lives: lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic

BMC Medical Research Methodology ◽

10.1186/s12874-021-01304-y ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 21 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Lonni Besançon ◽

Nathan Peiffer-Smadja ◽

Corentin Segalas ◽

Haiting Jiang ◽

Paola Masuzzo ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Research Output ◽

Open Science ◽

Scientific Process ◽

Science Practices ◽

Link Type ◽

Research Communities ◽

Research Findings ◽

Potential Impact ◽

Quality Of Research

AbstractIn the last decade Open Science principles have been successfully advocated for and are being slowly adopted in different research communities. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic many publishers and researchers have sped up their adoption of Open Science practices, sometimes embracing them fully and sometimes partially or in a sub-optimal manner. In this article, we express concerns about the violation of some of the Open Science principles and its potential impact on the quality of research output. We provide evidence of the misuses of these principles at different stages of the scientific process. We call for a wider adoption of Open Science practices in the hope that this work will encourage a broader endorsement of Open Science principles and serve as a reminder that science should always be a rigorous process, reliable and transparent, especially in the context of a pandemic where research findings are being translated into practice even more rapidly. We provide all data and scripts at https://osf.io/renxy/.

Download Full-text

Journal Editor and Associate Editor Perspectives on Research Reproducibility and Open Science

Remedial and Special Education ◽

10.1177/07419325211017294 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 074193252110172

Author(s):

Daniel M. Maggin

Keyword(s):

Social Sciences ◽

Special Education ◽

Journal Editor ◽

Associate Editor ◽

Open Science ◽

Science Practices ◽

Journal Editors ◽

Education School ◽

Special Education School ◽

Insight Into

Interest in transparent and open science is increasing in special education, school psychology, and related disciplines. Proponents for open science reforms provide evidence that researchers in special education, and the broader social sciences, engage in practices that mitigates its credibility and reduces the validity of information disseminated to practitioners and policymakers. In light of these issues, this article reports on a survey of journal editors-in-chief and associate editors to gain insight into concerns regarding research reproducibility, and the familiarity and viability of open science for improving research credibility. Results indicate that respondents were concerned about research reproducibility, were moderately familiar with open science practices, and viewed many as effective for improving research credibility. Finally, respondents supported the use of journals to encourage open science practices though there was little support for requiring their use. Findings are discussed in relation to open science and implications for research and practice.

Download Full-text

Open science reforms: Strengths, challenges, and future directions

10.35542/osf.io/sgfy8 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Kathryn R. Wentzel

Keyword(s):

Research Design ◽

Educational Psychology ◽

Open Science ◽

Policy And Practice ◽

Future Directions ◽

Science Practices ◽

Research Findings ◽

Potential Benefits ◽

The Impact

In this article, I comment on the potential benefits and limitations of open science reforms for improving the transparency and accountability of research, and enhancing the credibility of research findings within communities of policy and practice. Specifically, I discuss the role of replication and reproducibility of research in promoting better quality studies, the identification of generalizable principles, and relevance for practitioners and policymakers. Second, I suggest that greater attention to theory might contribute to the impact of open science practices, and discuss ways in which theory has implications for sampling, measurement and research design. Ambiguities concerning the aims of preregistration and registered reports also are highlighted. In conclusion, I discuss structural roadblocks to open science reform and reflect on the relevance of these reforms for educational psychology.

Download Full-text

Evidence-Based Surgery

DeckerMed Surgery ◽

10.2310/surg.2008 ◽

2017 ◽

Author(s):

Karl Y. Bilimoria ◽

Benjamin S Brooke

Keyword(s):

Scientific Evidence ◽

Surgical Techniques ◽

Internal Validity ◽

Surgical Care ◽

Evidence Based ◽

Services Research ◽

Surgical Decision ◽

Evidence Based Surgery ◽

Quality Of Research

The practice of surgery has undergone a dramatic evolution over the last century with the availability of new scientific evidence supporting different surgical techniques and management. Evidence-based surgery is defined as the judicious and systematic application of scientific evidence to surgical decision making and the establishment of standards of surgical care. This includes efforts to appraise the strength of scientific evidence and evaluate the quality of research studies or evidence, as well as efforts to interpret and apply evidence to clinical practice. In this review, we discuss important methodology and approaches in surgical health services research to accomplish these goals and improve the quality of care in surgery. By providing this overview, we hope readers will be able to navigate the surgical literature and apply evidence-based science to their own surgical practice. This review contains 1 figure, 3 tables, and 43 references. Key words: bias, comparative effectiveness, confounding, evidence, external validity, implementation science, internal validity, pragmatic trials, quality, risk adjustment, surgery

Download Full-text

A Systematic Review of Normative Studies Using Images of Common Objects

Frontiers in Psychology ◽

10.3389/fpsyg.2020.573314 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 11 ◽

Author(s):

Cristiane Souza ◽

Margarida V. Garrido ◽

Joana C. Carmo

Keyword(s):

Systematic Review ◽

Cultural Context ◽

Visual Complexity ◽

Open Science ◽

Future Research ◽

Daily Lives ◽

Science Practices ◽

Living Things ◽

Culturally Based

Common objects comprise living and non-living things people interact with in their daily-lives. Images depicting common objects are extensively used in different fields of research and intervention, such as linguistics, psychology, and education. Nevertheless, their adequate use requires the consideration of several factors (e.g., item-differences, cultural-context and confounding correlated variables), and careful validation procedures. The current study presents a systematic review of the available published norms for images of common objects. A systematic search using PRISMA guidelines indicated that despite their extensive use, the production of norms for such stimuli with adult populations is quite limited (N = 55), particularly for more ecological images, such as photos (N = 14). Among the several dimensions in which the items were assessed, the most commonly referred in our sample were familiarity, visual complexity and name agreement, illustrating some consistency across the reported dimensions while also indicating the limited examination of other potentially relevant dimensions for image processing. The lack of normative studies simultaneously examining affective, perceptive and semantic dimensions was also documented. The number of such normative studies has been increasing in the last years and published in relevant peer-reviewed journals. Moreover, their datasets and norms have been complying with current open science practices. Nevertheless, they are still scarcely cited and replicated in different linguistic and cultural contexts. The current study brings important theoretical contributions by characterizing images of common objects stimuli and their culturally-based norms while highlighting several important features that are likely to be relevant for future stimuli selection and evaluative procedures. The systematic scrutiny of these normative studies is likely to stimulate the production of new, robust and contextually-relevant normative datasets and to provide tools for enhancing the quality of future research and intervention.

Download Full-text

CURRENT BEST PRACTICES AND BIOBANKING RECOMMENDATIONS

Russian Clinical Laboratory Diagnostics ◽

10.18821/0869-2084-2019-64-12-769-776 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 64 (12) ◽

pp. 769-776 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Y. V. Doludin ◽

A. L. Borisova ◽

M. S. Pokrovskaya ◽

O. V. Stefanyuk ◽

O. V. Sivakova ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Best Practices ◽

Preanalytical Phase ◽

Wide Range ◽

Research Problems ◽

Processing And Storage ◽

And Storage ◽

Quality Of Research ◽

Selection Of

The biobank is a structure established with the goal of long-term responsible storage of biological samples and the associated data for their further use in scientific and clinical research. The objectives of biobanking are the creation of unified recommendations on: the planning of premises and the selection of equipment for storage; development of management methods and staff training; standardization of methods for the collection, shipping, processing and storage of biomaterial of various origins, as well as methods for quality control and validation of the applied methods; creation and use of databases of information accompanying biospecimens. The lack of common standards for conducting the preanalytical phase has been the cause of low accuracy and poor reproducibility of research results. To date, a large number of guidelines and best practices have been published that provide an answer to a wide range of problems in organizing the biobanking process. The article provides an overview of the most famous biobanking guidelines that can be used to solve various research problems. Biobanking in Russia is actively developing. Since 1996 there is a work on the legislative regulation of biobanking activities, as a result of which a number of regulatory documents have been issued. An important stage in the development of biobanking in Russia was the establishment of the “National Association of Biobanks and Biobanking Specialists” (NASBio) in 2018, which included representatives of medical and research institutions, commercial firms, and qualified specialists in the field of biobanking. One of the key tasks of NASBio is the adaptation and implementation of the best biobanking practices in Russian research institutes and centers. The use of modern guidelines and best practices on biobanking will lead to an increase in the quality of research and publications.

Download Full-text

Methodology and Scientific Competition

Episteme ◽

10.3366/epi.2011.0014 ◽

2011 ◽

Vol 8 (2) ◽

pp. 165-183 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Max Albert

Keyword(s):

Quality Standards ◽

Open Science ◽

Average Quality ◽

High Quality ◽

High Quality Research ◽

Quality Work ◽

Beauty Contest ◽

Relevant Field ◽

Quality Of Research

Why is the average quality of research in open science so high? The answer seems obvious. Science is highly competitive, and publishing high quality research is the way to rise to the top. Thus, researchers face strong incentives to produce high quality work. However, this is only part of the answer. High quality in science, after all, is what researchers in the relevant field consider to be high quality. Why and how do competing researchers coordinate on common quality standards? I argue that, on the methodological level, science is a dynamic beauty contest.

Download Full-text

A collective challenge: Open Science from the perspective of Science Europe

Mitteilungen der Vereinigung Österreichischer Bibliothekarinnen und Bibliothekare ◽

10.31263/voebm.v72i2.2831 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 72 (2) ◽

pp. 424-430

Author(s):

Marie Timmermann

Keyword(s):

Data Management ◽

Data Sharing ◽

Open Science ◽

Research Data ◽

Major Research ◽

Research Data Management ◽

Management Policies ◽

Good Research ◽

Quality Of Research

Open Science aims to enhance the quality of research by making research and its outputs openly available, reproducible and accessible. Science Europe, the association of major Research Funding Organisations and Research Performing Organisations, advocates data sharing as one of the core aspects of Open Science and promotes a more harmonised approach to data sharing policies. Good research data management is a prerequisite for Open Science and data management policies should be aligned as much as possible, while taking into account discipline-specific differences. Research data management is a broad and complex field with many actors involved. It needs collective efforts by all actors to work towards aligned policies that foster Open Science.

Download Full-text