Response to Flournoy (2021): Reflections on the benefits and challenges of communicating the results of a pre-registered study

In 2020, we posted a preprint online presenting the results of two pre-registered studies, now published in revised form (Ellwood-Lowe et al., 2021; original preprint archived at https://osf.io/ktsdp/). While undergoing the journal review process, circulation of this preprint encouraged open feedback from peers, including a thoughtful comment on our studies and pre-registration best practices by Dr. John Flournoy (Flournoy, 2021). Here we respond to the points raised in Flournoy’s comments, and discuss the benefits and challenges of pre-registering “high-risk” studies, particularly as early career researchers. We begin by reflecting on our scientific process between the first pre-registration and the ultimate dissemination of results—pulling back a curtain to reveal a piece of the research process that is often occluded. Next, we address Flournoy’s comments directly and explain how they were helpful in shaping the final version of our paper. Finally, we make suggestions for pre-registered studies in the future.

Reply to “On Clinical Utility and Systematic Reporting in Case Studies of Healthcare Process Mining. Comment on: 10.3390/ijerph17041348 ‘Towards the Use of Standardised Terms in Clinical Case Studies for Process Mining in Healthcare’ ”

Many thanks to Dr. Mordaunt for his thoughtful Comment, which we were delighted to read with great interest[...]

Social Welfare and Mutual Aid in the Medieval Countryside

Almost every social problem that troubles the conscience of a community has a history. Poverty, hunger, homelessness, the consequences of crime and epidemic disease—all are familiar topics of contemporary discourse that also mattered in the medieval past. Then, as now, questions about social welfare provoked debate and thoughtful comment in courts, churches, and political councils. The parameters of discussion naturally shifted with the ebb and flow of economic circumstance, but seldom more so than in the fourteenth century, when famine, recurrent plague, and labor unrest disrupted English society. In the villages and little market towns of the countryside, where most of the population lived, the threat of economic insecurity raised ethical and legal dilemmas about begging, vagrancy, and alms for the poor. All posed hard questions for people living in small groups, for they understood, better than solitary folk, how the ideals and practices of social welfare were grounded in communal life. Its conventions and norms reflected the shared values of neighbors and kin, as well as the social boundaries and inequalities of medieval society. How, then, did people who lived by the labor of their hands view the poor and disabled? Were the aged, the unemployed, the infirm, and chronically ill a part of the community, or did disability and want set them apart?These questions pose the problem of how social cohesion and a sense of belonging were maintained by people of diverse sorts and conditions in the medieval countryside. To ignore or hurriedly dismiss their interest in the subject of community life would be a mistake.

Causes of Encopresis

In Reply.— I appreciate Dr Weintraub's thoughtful comment regarding my reply on the report on encopresis by de Vos et al.1 In reality, the plan for the case I described2 was for the mother to familiarize the child with the nature of the toilet setting and to demonstrate casually the safety and harmlessness of sitting on the toilet but not necessarily at the time of the private function. However, that was the extent to which it was carried out by the mother, perhaps with the thought that it was a more realistic approach.

Letter to the Editor

In response to your thoughtful comment and criticism of the statement by Committee on Infectious Diseases, "Aspirin and Reye Syndrome" (Pediatrics 69:810, 1982), the Committee deliberated at two committee meetings and by two conference calls concerning this issue before we issued our statement. Further, we had the statement reviewed by the Committee on Drugs and the Executive Committee of the Academy, both of which forwarded comments to us. The statement was extensively edited in the process.

Letters to the Editor

We rarely receive correspondence about what is known in the trade as a "white-space filler," though these are selected with considerable care. We so heartily agree with Dr. Gruenwald's thoughtful comment that we repeat the paragraph from Philip Slater's book below. Some readers of Dr. Gruenwald's letter may have missed either the book or page 701 of the December Pediatrics. We behave toward our cities like an irascible farmer who never feeds his cow and then kicks hen when she fails to give enough milk.

Can the New Pediatrics Be Practiced?

This is written in answer to your request for "thoughtful comment" on your editorial "Can the New Pediatrics Be Practiced?" (Pediatrics 23:235, 1959). My answer is, "Yes, it Can!" It follows that the subject of this communication must be the "how" of that statement. The mere fact that "vague rumblings of discontent with the practice of pediatrics" are being expressed, and that the official journal of the American Academy of pediatrics contains an editorial on this fact, thus inviting discussion, is a sign of healthy growth. It seems to me that, if properly directed, these trends can be used to anabolize rather than to catabolize our specialty. It is true that pediatrics as a discipline within the structural framework of medicine is firmly established.

Editorial: Further Adventures of Colonel Hillendale

We are grateful to Eugene Burdick for his thoughtful comment on our editorial of last issue: "Colonel Hillendale and Homer Atkins." We hope, as he does, that some of our members will send in their comments.