scholarly journals Researcher Degrees of Freedom in the Psychology of Religion

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Jane Charles ◽  
James Edward Bartlett ◽  
Kyle J. Messick ◽  
Thomas Joseph Coleman ◽  
Alex Uzdavines
Keyword(s):  
Systematic Review ◽  
Degrees Of Freedom ◽  
Psychology Of Religion ◽  
Open Science ◽  
Science Practices ◽  
Replication Crisis ◽  
The Way

There is a push in psychology toward more transparent practices, stemming partially as a response to the replication crisis. We argue that the psychology of religion should help lead the way toward these new, more transparent practices to ensure a robust and dynamic subfield. One of the major issues that proponents of Open Science practices hope to address is researcher degrees of freedom (RDF). We pre-registered and conducted a systematic review of the 2017 issues from three psychology of religion journals. We aimed to identify the extent to which the psychology of religion has embraced Open Science practices and the role of RDF within the subfield. We found that many of the methodologies that help to increase transparency, such as pre-registration, have yet to be adopted by those in the subfield. In light of these findings, we present recommendations for addressing the issue of transparency in the psychology of religion and outline how to move toward these new Open Science practices.

scholarly journals (Re)Building Trust? Journals’ Open Science Badges Influence Trust in Scientists.

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jürgen Schneider ◽  
Tom Rosman ◽  
Augustin Kelava ◽  
Samuel Merk
Keyword(s):  
Journal Article ◽  
Effective Means ◽  
Open Science ◽  
Epistemic Beliefs ◽  
Science Standards ◽  
Science Practices ◽  
Replication Crisis ◽  
Title Pages ◽  
Moderating Role

As a response to the replication crisis, reforms call for the implementation of open science standards. In this regard, open science badges are a promising method to signal a study’s adherence to open science practices (OSP). In an experimental study, we investigated whether badges on journal article title pages affect non-scientists’ trust in scientists. Furthermore, we analyzed the moderating role of epistemic beliefs in this regard. We randomly assigned 270 non-scientists to two of three conditions: Badges awarded (visible compliance to OSP), badges not awarded (visible non-compliance to OSP) and no badges (compliance not visible, control condition). Results indicate that badges influence trust in scientists as well as the epistemic beliefs of participants. However, epistemic beliefs did not moderate the effect of badges on trust. In sum, our paper provides support to the notion that badges are an effective means to promote epistemic beliefs and trust in scientists.

The Role of Open Science Practices in Scaling Evidence-Based Prevention Programs

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lauren H. Supplee ◽  
Robert T. Ammerman ◽  
Anne K. Duggan ◽  
John A. List ◽  
Dana Suskind
Keyword(s):  
Prevention Programs ◽  
Open Science ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
Science Practices

Open science reforms: Strengths, challenges, and future directions

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.

scholarly journals Making the black box transparent: A template and tutorial for (pre-)registration of studies using Experience Sampling Methods (ESM)

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Olivia J Kirtley ◽  
Ginette Lafit ◽  
Robin Achterhof ◽  
Anu Pauliina Hiekkaranta ◽  
Inez Myin-Germeys
Keyword(s):  
Degrees Of Freedom ◽  
Sampling Method ◽  
Experience Sampling ◽  
Open Science ◽  
Science Practices ◽  
Methodological Rigor ◽  
Assessment Techniques ◽  
Ecological Momentary ◽  
Momentary Assessment ◽  
Experience Sampling Methods

A growing interest in understanding complex and dynamic psychological processes as they occur in everyday life has led to an increase in studies using Ambulatory Assessment techniques, including the Experience Sampling Method (ESM) and Ecological Momentary Assessment (EMA). There are, however, numerous “forking paths” and researcher degrees of freedom, even beyond those typically encountered with other research methodologies. Whilst a number of researchers working with ESM techniques are actively engaged in efforts to increase the methodological rigor and transparency of such research, currently, there is little routine implementation of open science practices in ESM research. In the current paper, we discuss the ways in which ESM research is especially vulnerable to threats to transparency, reproducibility and replicability. We propose that greater use of (pre-)registration, a cornerstone of open science, may address some of these threats to the transparency of ESM research. (Pre-)registration of ESM research is not without challenges, including model selection, accounting for potential model convergence issues and the use of pre-existing datasets. As these may prove to be significant barriers to (pre-)registration for ESM researchers, we also discuss ways of overcoming these challenges and of documenting them in a (pre-)registration. A further challenge is that current general templates do not adequately capture the unique features of ESM. Here we present a (pre-)registration template for ESM research, adapted from the original Pre-Registration Challenge (Mellor et al., 2019) and pre-registration of pre-existing data (van den Akker et al., 2020) templates, and provide examples of how to complete this.

scholarly journals A Systematic Review of Normative Studies Using Images of Common Objects

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.

scholarly journals The past, present, and future of ego depletion

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Inzlicht ◽  
Malte Friese
Keyword(s):  
Social Psychology ◽  
Ego Depletion ◽  
Open Science ◽  
Science Practices ◽  
Current State ◽  
Scientific Status ◽  
Replication Crisis ◽  
History Of ◽  
Controversial Topic ◽  
Mere Existence

At the center of social psychology just a few years ago, ego depletion is now widely seen as a controversial topic, one of the chief victims of the replication crisis. Despite over 600 studies of apparent support, many are now asking if ego depletion is even real. Here, we comment on the articles included in this Special Issue: Ego Depletion. Specifically, we delineate the contributions and limitations of these articles by embedding them in a brief history of ego depletion, describing the current state of uncertainty about ego depletion’s scientific status, and outlining necessary steps for the study of ego depletion to have a healthy future. To us, the most troubling aspect of this controversy is not what is suggests about ego depletion; but what it suggests about social psychology more broadly. If the mere existence of ego depletion is seriously doubted by many, what can be confidently regarded as real in social psychology? By increasing the precision of our theories, continuously validating our manipulations and measures, and practicing the full suite of open science practices we have the potential to identify legitimate and robust effects and build a cumulative and trustworthy psychological science.

scholarly journals ‘Trust Us’: Open Data and Preregistration in Political Science and International Relations

2022 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bermond Scoggins ◽  
Matthew Peter Robertson
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Political Science ◽  
Statistical Inference ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Open Data ◽  
Population Level ◽  
Open Science ◽  
Science Practices ◽  
Level Data ◽  
Replication Crisis

The scientific method is predicated on transparency -- yet the pace at which transparent research practices are being adopted by the scientific community is slow. The replication crisis in psychology showed that published findings employing statistical inference are threatened by undetected errors, data manipulation, and data falsification. To mitigate these problems and bolster research credibility, open data and preregistration have increasingly been adopted in the natural and social sciences. While many political science and international relations journals have committed to implementing these reforms, the extent of open science practices is unknown. We bring large-scale text analysis and machine learning classifiers to bear on the question. Using population-level data -- 93,931 articles across the top 160 political science and IR journals between 2010 and 2021 -- we find that approximately 21% of all statistical inference papers have open data, and 5% of all experiments are preregistered. Despite this shortfall, the example of leading journals in the field shows that change is feasible and can be effected quickly.

scholarly journals Preregistration specificity & adherence: A review of preregistered gambling studies & cross-disciplinary comparison

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Heirene ◽  
Debi LaPlante ◽  
Eric R. Louderback ◽  
Brittany Keen ◽  
Marjan Bakker ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Degrees Of Freedom ◽  
Open Data ◽  
Open Science ◽  
Eligibility Criteria ◽  
Science Practices ◽  
Methodological Choices ◽  
The Mean ◽  
The Many ◽  
Practical Recommendations ◽  
Current Practices

Study preregistration is one of several “open science” practices (e.g., open data, preprints) that researchers use to improve the transparency and rigour of their research. As more researchers adopt preregistration as a regular research practice, examining the nature and content of preregistrations can help identify strengths and weaknesses of current practices. The value of preregistration, in part, relates to the specificity of the study plan and the extent to which investigators adhere to this plan. We identified 53 preregistrations from the gambling studies field meeting our predefined eligibility criteria and scored their level of specificity using a 23-item protocol developed to measure the extent to which a clear and exhaustive preregistration plan restricts various researcher degrees of freedom (RDoF; i.e., the many methodological choices available to researchers when collecting and analysing data, and when reporting their findings). We also scored studies on a 32-item protocol that measured adherence to the preregistered plan in the study manuscript. We found that gambling preregistrations had low specificity levels on most RDoF. However, a comparison with a sample of cross-disciplinary preregistrations (N = 52; Bakker et al., 2020) indicated that gambling preregistrations scored higher on 12 (of 29) items. Thirteen (65%) of the 20 associated published articles or preprints deviated from the protocol without declaring as much (the mean number of undeclared deviations per article was 2.25, SD = 2.34). Overall, while we found improvements in specificity and adherence over time (2017-2020), our findings suggest the purported benefits of preregistration—including increasing transparency and reducing RDoF—are not fully achieved by current practices. Using our findings, we provide 10 practical recommendations that can be used to support and refine preregistration practices.

scholarly journals The Past, Present, and Future of Ego Depletion

2019 ◽  
Vol 50 (5-6) ◽  
pp. 370-378 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Inzlicht ◽  
Malte Friese
Keyword(s):  
Social Psychology ◽  
Ego Depletion ◽  
Open Science ◽  
Self Control ◽  
Science Practices ◽  
Current State ◽  
Replication Crisis ◽  
History Of ◽  
Controversial Topic ◽  
Mere Existence

Abstract. At the center of social psychology just a few years ago, ego depletion is now widely seen as a controversial topic, one of the chief victims of the replication crisis. Despite over 600 studies of apparent support, many are now asking if ego depletion is even real. Here, we comment on the articles included in this Special Issue: Ego Depletion and Self-Control: Conceptual and Empirical Advances. Specifically, we delineate the contributions and limitations of these articles by embedding them in a brief history of ego depletion, describing the current state of uncertainty about ego depletion’s scientific status, and outlining necessary steps for the study of ego depletion to have a healthy future. To us, the most troubling aspect of this controversy is not what it suggests about ego depletion, but what it suggests about social psychology more broadly. If the mere existence of ego depletion is seriously doubted by many, what can be confidently regarded as real in social psychology? By increasing the precision of our theories, continuously validating our manipulations and measures, and practicing the full suite of open science practices, we have the potential to identify legitimate and robust effects and build a cumulative and trustworthy psychological science.

scholarly journals Dawning of a new age? Economics journals’ data policies on the test bench

2021 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-29
Author(s):  
Sven Vlaeminck
Keyword(s):  
Open Science ◽  
Reproducible Research ◽  
Research Libraries ◽  
Science Practices ◽  
The Past ◽  
Journal Citation Reports ◽  
Economics Journals ◽  
Research Organisations ◽  
Published Research ◽  
The Way

In the field of social sciences and particularly in economics, studies have frequently reported a lack of reproducibility of published research. Most often, this is due to the unavailability of data reproducing the findings of a study. However, over the past years, debates on open science practices and reproducible research have become stronger and louder among research funders, learned societies, and research organisations. Many of these have started to implement data policies to overcome these shortcomings. Against this background, the article asks if there have been changes in the way economics journals handle data and other materials that are crucial to reproduce the findings of empirical articles. For this purpose, all journals listed in the Clarivate Analytics Journal Citation Reports edition for economics have been evaluated for policies on the disclosure of research data. The article describes the characteristics of these data policies and explicates their requirements. Moreover, it compares the current findings with the situation some years ago. The results show significant changes in the way journals handle data in the publication process. Research libraries can use the findings of this study for their advisory activities to best support researchers in submitting and providing data as required by journals.

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