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Rat park is unreplicatable. It's a sham. I'm sorry.

by forrestthewoods 10y ago

forkandwait 10y ago
Sources?
- forrestthewoods 10y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rat_Park#Reaction_to_the_experiment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rat_Park#Reaction_to_the_exper... http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9148292?dopt=Abstract http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9148292?dopt=Abstract I should say, the results have not been replicated. There's only been a few attempts. Maybe the replicators screwed up! To quote the root article: "But ultimately I should be able to replicate your findings and you should be able to replicate my findings, otherwise it’s not science, it’s bullshit." So far Rat Park has not be replicated.
  - srtjstjsj 10y ago
    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2616610?dopt=Abstract https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2616610?dopt=Abstract found that isolated rats took more heroin earlier than rats in "group housing". It's not clear from the abstract how the "group housing" compares to "Rat Park", but it may be the case that even better housing would delay heroin ingestion even longer. Rat Park has been under-studied.
  - forkandwait 10y ago
    Yet again, my take away is that most psychology experiments are mostly bullshit. If there were 12 attempts to replicate, with the same setup, and 10 of them failed succeeded, we might actually be able to say something...
justratsinacoat 10y ago
>Rat park is unreplicatable Much of social science is unreplicatable, psych especially. Is this because it's wrong, or because of other factors? Take the easiest, most commonly replicated, least contentious conclusion one can come to in a drug study, namely [0]: "rats will intravenously self-administer (IVSA) cocaine". As you can see if you read the link, there's all kinds of caveats to this statement! If you're not very scrupulous about everything from catheter diameter to the cleanliness of your lab coat (yes, seriously), even this piece of orthodox obviousness can suddenly become "unreplicatable". >It's a sham It's very difficult to get funding for a large-scale drug study that goes against the underpinnings of the grant, hypothesis and conclusion of almost all the other drug abuse rat-studies of the last forty years. Publish-or-perish culture is no less pervasive in psych, and generally speaking, heterodox opinions don't get a lot of airtime in grant application review, let alone academic journals. How many other institutions have even tried to replicate Rat Park, let alone actually achieved some shadow of its methodology? I think the answer might surprise you. edit: or not, you've looked it up! Great! See?! >I'm sorry I'm sorry, too. [0] http://drugmonkey.scientopia.org/2014/07/08/the-most-replicated-finding-in-drug-abuse-science/ http://drugmonkey.scientopia.org/2014/07/08/the-most-replica...

Rat park is unreplicatable. It's a sham. I'm sorry.

forkandwait 10y ago

Sources?

forrestthewoods 10y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rat_Park#Reaction_to_the_experiment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rat_Park#Reaction_to_the_exper... http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9148292?dopt=Abstract http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9148292?dopt=Abstract I should say, the results have not been replicated. There's only been a few attempts. Maybe the replicators screwed up! To quote the root article: "But ultimately I should be able to replicate your findings and you should be able to replicate my findings, otherwise it’s not science, it’s bullshit." So far Rat Park has not be replicated.
- srtjstjsj 10y ago
  https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2616610?dopt=Abstract https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2616610?dopt=Abstract found that isolated rats took more heroin earlier than rats in "group housing". It's not clear from the abstract how the "group housing" compares to "Rat Park", but it may be the case that even better housing would delay heroin ingestion even longer. Rat Park has been under-studied.
- forkandwait 10y ago
  Yet again, my take away is that most psychology experiments are mostly bullshit. If there were 12 attempts to replicate, with the same setup, and 10 of them failed succeeded, we might actually be able to say something...

justratsinacoat 10y ago

>Rat park is unreplicatable Much of social science is unreplicatable, psych especially. Is this because it's wrong, or because of other factors? Take the easiest, most commonly replicated, least contentious conclusion one can come to in a drug study, namely [0]: "rats will intravenously self-administer (IVSA) cocaine". As you can see if you read the link, there's all kinds of caveats to this statement! If you're not very scrupulous about everything from catheter diameter to the cleanliness of your lab coat (yes, seriously), even this piece of orthodox obviousness can suddenly become "unreplicatable". >It's a sham It's very difficult to get funding for a large-scale drug study that goes against the underpinnings of the grant, hypothesis and conclusion of almost all the other drug abuse rat-studies of the last forty years. Publish-or-perish culture is no less pervasive in psych, and generally speaking, heterodox opinions don't get a lot of airtime in grant application review, let alone academic journals. How many other institutions have even tried to replicate Rat Park, let alone actually achieved some shadow of its methodology? I think the answer might surprise you. edit: or not, you've looked it up! Great! See?! >I'm sorry I'm sorry, too. [0] http://drugmonkey.scientopia.org/2014/07/08/the-most-replicated-finding-in-drug-abuse-science/ http://drugmonkey.scientopia.org/2014/07/08/the-most-replica...