To the Editor:
“‘I Want to Burn Things to the Ground’” (The Chronicle Review, September 11) generated considerable debate among psychological scientists about an ongoing methods revolution in the field. This revolution is in response to psychology’s so-called “replication crisis”, a period of self-reflection that revealed problematic flexibility in data analysis, publication bias (null findings are less likely to be submitted and/or published than positive findings), and disappointingly low replicability rates — challenges that are also playing out across disciplines, ranging from cancer biology to neuroscience. Many worry, and this recent article argued, that current methodological reforms have created an unnecessarily harsh, destructive, and divisive environment in our critical discourse.
We see the exact opposite. We see a rapidly growing network of researchers trying to improve their field through a score of activities and initiatives that are constructive, collaborative, and collegial. In fact, we argue, here and elsewhere, that the field is experiencing what might be best called a “Cooperative Revolution”, and that this revolution is making our science better.
Perhaps the most visible hallmark of the cooperative revolution has been the dramatic increase in large-scale collaborations across many areas of psychological science (e.g., ManyLabs, ManyBabies, the Psychological Science Accelerator, Registered Replication Reports, and StudySwap). Traditionally, most psychological studies have been conducted by a single lab at one university. This limits the scope of the projects a researcher can take on — especially for topic areas that involve studying specific hard-to-recruit participant groups. Large-scale collaborations create new opportunities for conducting highly powered studies and testing moderators even in resource-intensive topic areas.
Collaborations at this scale also require high levels of transparency, such as preregistration of hypotheses, procedures, and analysis plans, and sharing data, code, and materials. On top of that, the often international nature of such collaborations can stimulate diversity and inclusion.
Social media and other online platforms have provided researchers with fast ways to connect with other scholars, share and debate ideas, and learn from each other. Such platforms are accessible to people from all career stages, instead of only a limited number of eminent insiders.
PsychMAP, a Facebook discussion group, provides a space for researchers to engage in open-minded and nuanced conversations about improving methods. The group has thousands of members from around the world, from undergraduates to senior professors, and is lightly moderated to steer conversations away from focusing on specific individuals and toward broader questions about methods and practices.
We also see the spirit of cooperation, constructive discussion, and concrete progress in the Society for the Improvement of Psychological Science (SIPS). SIPS is a new academic organization aimed at bringing a wide range of scholars together to improve methods and practices in psychological science. In contrast to most traditional conferences, the annual SIPS meetings are action-oriented: Attendees learn new skills or design pragmatic solutions for specific problems in hands-on workshops and “hack-a-thons.”
The cooperative revolution has also benefited from exciting statistical innovations. Several free “statistical spellcheckers” have been developed, such as GRIM, statcheck, and p-checker. Researchers can easily use these tools to quickly screen their manuscripts for statistical errors before they submit them to a journal.
Researchers have also developed online platforms to archive and share data and research materials (e.g., Databrary, and the Open Science Framework). Other platforms, such as Curate Science, are summarizing results of different research lines in real time. These resources create a flexible ecosystem of tools that researchers can use to speed up their current workflows, more easily adopt new practices, and quickly obtain the latest information about the current state of a certain theory.
The spirit of cooperative material sharing has extended to how we teach the next generation of scientists. Psychologists have worked together to generate excellent reading lists on methods reforms and reproducibility, which they then share freely with others to use in both graduate and undergraduate courses. Some have even posted complete syllabi and course materials, to be amended and adopted by any instructor who finds value in bringing those materials into their classroom.
To increase inclusivity in teaching, a relatively large and diverse group of scientists has been discussing the importance of offering students paid research opportunities instead of purely voluntary positions. This provides students, who need summer income to pay their way through school, with critical experience for applying to graduate school. Anecdotally, we have noticed a promising uptick in advertisements for paid summer internships in some excellent labs in psychological science.
Psychology’s revolution is well underway and is gaining momentum. Though considerable progress has already been made, there is still much work to be done. Whether you are a student just getting his feet wet in lab work, an early career researcher carving out her scholarly niche, or a full professor with decades of experience, we hope that you will join us in our pursuit of research cooperation, collaboration integrity, transparency, rigor, and collegiality.
Chris Chartier
Associate professor, Ashland University
Melissa Kline
Postdoctoral researcher, MIT
Randy McCarthy
Research associate, Northern Illinois University
Michèle Nuijten
Assistant professor, Tilburg University
Daniel J. Dunleavy
Doctoral candidate, Florida State University, College of Social Work
Alison Ledgerwood
Associate professor and Chancellor’s fellow, UC Davis
