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The big problem with this is that the more diversity you have in your study participant set (gender, age, skin color, handedness, etc), the bigger your study ha
by est31 8y ago
The big problem with this is that the more diversity you have in your study participant set (gender, age, skin color, handedness, etc), the bigger your study has to be to correct for potential biases in results caused by differences in the participants unrelated to what you're testing. And the bigger the study, the more it'll cost, so there will be less studies overall.
- Cthulhu_ 8y agoI am glad that there are some big studies out there though; big in terms of participants, or big in terms of long-term research - about subjects like nutrition, cancer and heart problem risks, fertility, economic mobility, etc.
- SiempreViernes 8y agoIt's not so much a problem as simply the cost of doing proper science, and just because you make a small study you don't have to make it cheaply (though you probably are if you're an academic).
- yakubin 8y agoI guess the dilemma is whether you want to do good science or just get your papers published for a low price.
- yoz-y 8y agoThere should be incentive for laboratories to produce bigger and better studies rather than a bunch of small ones. Especially since a study with 300 participants is worth immensely more than 10 studies with 30 participants.
- taurath 8y agoEven among 18-21 year old college american women there are ridiculous amounts of variables that you can't control for. Give up the idea that you can control for biases in psychology. Do big mixed tests, then if there's positive outcomes see if its correlated to any of those groups. Then you can do more tests on the groups that didn't respond.
- est31 8y agoSorry, that's a sunken cost fallacy.