Pre-registration of studies is an interesting concept in that regard (also briefly mentioned in the article), where researchers can submit their study design an

Pre-registration of studies is an interesting concept in that regard (also briefly mentioned in the article), where researchers can submit their study design and goals to a journal before conducting the study. It will then be accepted or rejected for publication based on the study design etc., not on the eventual outcome (as long as the study was actually conducted as promised and with care, of course). The idea is probably only applicable to a small subset of scientific work (not good for exploratory and very novel stuff, for instance), but in certain specific areas it might make publication of negative results a more viable path for scientists because they don't have to fear that their idea was bad or they seem incompetent because of a negative result. (Since their design was accepted, at least some other people thought it was a good idea too.)