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Psychology being an inexact science, it is difficult for someone else to repeat the same experiment and check the validity of the results (such as in the physic
by adharmad 13y ago
Psychology being an inexact science, it is difficult for someone else to repeat the same experiment and check the validity of the results (such as in the physical sciences). Even if someone does get different numbers, the validity of the repeat experiment itself can be questioned, or it can be put down to any number of variables. eg - the human subjects themselves will not the same.
- jorleif 13y agoThe much bigger problem is that nobody tries to repeat findings, because there is no incentive to do so. There is an asymmetry between positive and negative findings. Say I make a study that shows that X causes Y. Then someone else tries to replicate that. They find no statistically significant evidence that X causes Y. Now, in medicine this may be a result in itself, if X causes Y is a well established result. But, in many other fields, such as computer science, a negative finding is usually just because the researcher made a mistake (bug in code etc.), so you have to work really hard to prove that there is no relation between X and Y, and it is hard to publish these kinds of results unless you can somehow rigorously prove the opposite result.