Controversy continues to swirl around the retraction of a Frontiers paper linking climate skepticism to conspiratorial ideation, with three editors resigning from various Frontiers journals, and competing narratives. The authors say the journal retracted the paper because of a fear of legal threats, while the journal, and critics of the study, has said it was withdrawn because the paper did not protect the rights of its subjects.
Whatever the issues with the paper, we and others have been saying that the journal stumbled since the study was first retracted last year. The publisher continues to insist, for example, that there is no contradiction between their retraction notice — agreed upon by the editors and the authors — which said that the journal “did not identify any issues with the academic and ethical aspects of the study” and a later statement saying that the paper “did not sufficiently protect the rights of the studied subjects.”
Today, editor-in-chief Henry Markham acknowledged missteps in a blog post. Here’s how it starts:
The retracted Recursive Fury paper has created quite a blogger and twitter storm. A sensational storm indeed, with hints to conspiracy theories, claims of legal threats and perceived contradictions. It has been fury – one of the strongest human emotions – that has (perhaps understandably at first sight) guided the discussion around this retraction. Not surprisingly though, the truth is not as sensational and much simpler. The studied subjects were explicitly identified in the paper without their consent. It is well acknowledged and accepted that in order to protect a subject’s rights and avoid a potentially defamatory outcome, one must obtain the subject’s consent if they can be identified in a scientific paper. The mistake was detected after publication, and the authors and Frontiers worked hard together for several months to try to find a solution. In the end, those efforts were not successful. The identity of the subjects could not be protected and the paper had to be retracted. Frontiers then worked closely with the authors on a mutually agreed and measured retraction statement to avoid the retraction itself being misused. From the storm this has created, it would seem we did not succeed.
Read the rest of the post here.
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The ethical (and other) problems with that paper were clear from the very first moment it was supplied for publication, including the retraction by two of the four peer reviewers.
Indeed there is a contradiction between the first and second statement from Frontiers, but the first statement was the result of negotiations between the authors and Frontiers, which tried to get the authors out of the wind.
But as the authors and one of the peer reviewers tried to blame Frontiers over the retraction, Frontiers was obliged to set the record straight.
It seems that Frontiers have had to explain research ethics in human participants (which is included in the Australian National Statement, and UWA policies) to a Professor of Psychology, that he didn’t understand….
Link is incorrect at the end of 1st paragraph (“did not protect the rights of its subjects”). I imagine you meant to link to http://www.frontiersin.org/blog/Retraction_of_Recursive_Fury_A_Statement/812
Fixed, thanks.
I am a biologist and I am doing research on wild birds. I have read the paper (Stephan Lewandowsky, John Cook, Klaus Oberauer & Michael Marriott, 2013, Recursive fury: conspiracist ideation in the blogosphere in response to research on conspiracist ideation, Frontiers in Psychology, http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/files/2014/03/fpsyg-04-00073.pdf ).
I would like to congratulate the authors with this excellent piece of work. Excellent introduction and discussion and excellent field work. The paper is easy readable for non-psychologists as well. Highly recommended for any student of psychology who wants to become a good scientist.
“Preparation of this paper was facilitated by a Discovery Outstanding Researcher Award from the Australian Research Council to the first author.” Good decision of ARC.
Some of my study subjects attack me, try to hit me or want to bite me when I am collecting my data. I often get very dirty during field work. So don’t bother about nasty behaviour of the study subjects and keep studying them.
I tend to advise the authors, and anyone else, to ignore the decision of Frontiers to retract this paper. I fully agree with the editors who resigned because of the decision to retract this paper.
“Some of my study subjects attack me, try to hit me or want to bite me when I am collecting my data. I often get very dirty during field work. So don’t bother about nasty behaviour of the study subjects and keep studying them.”
I did enjoy this post. It made me thankful that I work with organisms (fruit flies and slugs) that can’t attack me in the way humans can.
Nonetheless, I do believe it to be a serious breach of ethics to publish identifying information about human subjects without their consent. Birds and flies don’t care, but humans can suffer consequences if their medical or psychological information is published.
Klaas, you may be attacked by the animals you study as part of an objective, impartial study. But even for a study of animals it is unethical behaviour to vigorously attack the animals while you study them and then publish their reactions as psychological (animal) disorders…
Klass,
All I can say is “oh heavens”.
I agree the paper might seem like a good read if you skim. But I think that opinion could only be held by someone who doesn’t visit the underlying links to examine the ‘evidence’ for the claims.
One difficulty is even straightforward requests for information are diagnosed as somehow suggesting ‘conspiracy ideation’. To use an example: According to the paper, the ‘first’ person to have ideated the conspiracy theory ‘ “Skeptic” blogs contacted after delay’ is Geoff Chambers. (Given the nick-name for the theory, it’s worth mentioning that skeptic blogs were contacted after a delay. So presumably the ‘conspiracy ideation’ is not evidence by merely knowing that fact is true.) Let’s look at how Geoffs comment were taken and evidence of some sort of conspiracy ideation. To do the explanation justice, I must give some background information:
On 9/2/2012 Lewandowsky posted a discussion about contacting skeptic blogs at his own blog: http://www.shapingtomorrowsworld.org/ccc2.html
I would characterize his post an ‘snarky’; others might think otherwise. But in the third paragraph Lewandowsky wrote,
Geoff read what Lewandowsky wrote. As he was curious about the dates when invitations were sent and asked a question which you will find in the 3rd comment on that post. It is rather brief and reads:
I would think a person who was not blinded by their own pre-conceived notions about what this question meant would think geoff was asking for clarification of information in paragraph 3.
The next two comments are by “Lewandowsky supporters” Eli Rabbet and Mike H.
For those who do not know “The Gish Gallop is the debating technique of drowning the opponent in such a torrent of small arguments that their opponent cannot possibly answer or address each one in real time. ”
The next comment is interesting because– if I interpret the tone correctly– it is challenging and includes an example of someone hurling the accusation that the geoff’s one-sentence question somehow amounts to a conspiracy theory:
(Italics mine.)
Responding to Eli (#4), MikeH (#5) comments (which I interpret as challenging), Geoff posts the 6th comment in the thread
I’ve italicized the explanatory text that was stripped by Lewandowsky when this quote was presented in the SI for Fury. The previous three comments were not included.
If not stripped out of the full quote, the first sentence in Geoffs (#6) suggests to a reader Geoff is responding to what he perceives as a rather snarky accusation his question is a ‘gish gallop”. If MikeH comment had been presented to a reader, the main part of the Geoff’s response appears show geof willing to respond to MikeH’s demand that he justify one-sentence request for clarification. The ‘kindly’ could be interpreted as Geoff explaining that he was trying to ask a fairly polite question. Notably: Geoff finishes is comment by supplying his motive for asking the question,
So: we have an explicitly stated motive. Geoff wants to know information to remedy something he considers to be a deficiency of the methodology section.
I think it is entirely reasonable that people at skeptic blogs would wish to know the identifies of blog contacted both out of pure curiosity, to evaluate the degree of skepticism, and to evalaute whether they were larger more popular blogs, smaller less popular blogs, truly out there “sky dragon” blogs, lukewarmer blogs or so on. Once we learned that skeptic blogs were invited after data collection was well underway, we wished to know details about when they were contacted. It’s possible people could think these details could affect our interpretation of the data as we might wish to know the range of people who participated. I think all of this.
Now, it seems to me one can debate whether the differential treatment accorded invited blogs should or should not have been in the methodology section of the paper or whether these details matter. Geoff suggested they should have been in the methodology section. I think they ‘matter’ to the outcome. I also tend to think major differences in methodology should be discussed in methodology sections; minor differences could be omitted.
So it seems odd for researchers in Fury suggest that someone holding the opinion any differences in the method of recruiting activist and skeptic blogs should be included in methodology section and wishing to know what they are is exhbiting “Nihilistic Skepticism” (NS) , or accusing Lewindowsky and his coauthors of “Nefarious Intent” (NI) or believing “Nothing happens by Accident” (NoA) or that the ‘official account must be wrong’ (MbW). (The final one is particularly odd as there was no ‘official’ explanation for the observed differences in timing of invitations and geoff was actually soliciting one through his questions).
In fact, we now know there were quite a few of differences:
1) Lewandowsky invited the skeptic blogs after links were already posted at the other blogs. The invitations went out between 1 and 4 weeks after links were already posted on activist blogs.
2) Some of the activist blogs knew Lewandowsky was involved in the survey; this information was concealed from others. We know this because Lewandowsky’s name appeared on some of the activists blogs.
3) Some activist blogs were recruited through a by-invitiation only forum that is often characterized as an “activist” blog. (Planet3.0 run by Michael Tobis.) So, with respect to recruiting activist blogs, the methodology involved some ‘preconditioning’ in the sense that some blogs may have participated because they learned more detailed information on that forum, as members learning there tended to trust others in that forum and they learned of the survey from a person who they were familiar with. This precondition did not exist for skeptic blogs. And
4) The only means by which skeptic blogs received information was through a terse email from someone named Hanich who they had never heard of. The invitation did not mention Lewandowsky.
One might still debate whether these things should be revealed in methodology. In many cases, we only know these things because collectively they were tracked down, not voluntered. But once again, I don’t think a difference of opinion on this point amounts to “NI”, “NS”, “NoA” or “MwB”– yet, it is this difference of opinion that seems to represent evidence of these traits.
Notably: although the comment on the Lewandowsky’s post contains 59 comments, it appears Lewandowsky never answered Geoff’s question about when he invited various blogs. Yet, despite Lewandowsky’s habitual refusal to provide information, people continuuing to ask questions seems to be taken as evidence that their thinking exhibits “MwB” — whose symptoms are to reject the explanations provided.
That people who do not delve into the ‘evidence’ provided might believe the paper is a good read and supports it claim I can believe. That it is “excellent piece of work” is beyond me.
I find this whole business of “identifying human subjects without their consent” a complete non-sense argument. You might as well close down newspapers, as they tend to analyse public statements of identified people, like presidents, company officials, scientists, protesters etc. It would be a problem if they would publish statements by people that are not identified. It is obvious that statements, oral or written, made in public imply consent.
Hans – some of us still had the quaint idea that “peer reviewed” scientific literature should be held to a higher standard truth than the transient outpourings of tabloid hacks.
Presumably that’s why peer reviewed papers were exempted from libel litigation in the 2013 Libel Act – a decision, I suspect, many people reading this may now be pondering.
Worth noting: Lewandowsky actually used fake quotations in the early version of this work.
Hans,
Newspapers aren’t purporting to diagnose psychological conditions based on professional qualifications. They are not claiming to transmit “objective” scientific truth. They are politics by another name. The difference between that and academic literature is (or should be) night and day. Surely you can understand that difference.
If Lewandowsky wants to write an op-ed in the New York Times denigrating those whose views he finds politically unacceptable he should have it. That’s the appropriate forum to respond to public comments of that nature. But to dress up his personal vendettas against those he disagrees with into an academic paper in which he “diagnoses” them all as crazy crosses the line from science to politics. It’s an abuse of the field and of academia, for the conflict of interest alone. How is it possible for a scientist to evaluate his declared enemies (see his blog postings) with any sort of reasonable professional detachment? It’s not possible. Perhaps another psychologist with no connection to Lewandowsky or his detractors could study the situation from a truly neutral position, but there’s no chance that Lewandowsky, with his deep personal involvement, can. He would rightly be one of the subjects of whatever study was done, and not one of the researchers.
Thanks Lucia
I’ve written 28 articles itemising what’s wrong with Lewandowsky’s two papers, but I’d missed that one.
If that seems amiss, I should explain that the article Lucia is quoting from is one of ten which Lewandowsky wrote on his blog over a seventeen-day period, all of them making sarcastic remarks about critics of his “Moon Hoax” paper, and which elicited a total of 2308 comments. During the period that Lewandowsky was making these provocative remarks, his coauthors Cook and Marriott were collecting responses from the critics for the now retracted “Recursive Fury” paper. Naturally, the more he insulted us and refused to answer our questions, the more furious we got.
Back in 2010, Cook was already expressing his admiration for Lewandowsky’s penchant for
“poking the ants’ nest”.
If people can’t see what’s wrong with this, I don’t think anything we say can help them.
Poking ants’ nests can be ok in certain context.
But if that metaphor means interacting with human subjects, observing their responses, reporting it in a journal, that’s a “human experiment”. If the subjects can be identified, their is risk of harm (with harm as defined in Austrlia’s “National Statement on Ethical Conduct in Human Research”. Either the fact of ‘intervention’ (through interaction) and the risk of harm means the research and its publication require consent.
None was obtained. It wasn’t even sought.
“Frontiers’ core mission is to improve peer review.”
A failure of anonymity in a psychology paper should have been caught by every peer reviewer.
Either Frontiers failed to improve peer review, or if this is an improvement over the standard level of peer review then the bar must be way down below the swamp and alligators.
the issue is not the comments.. but the people ‘choosing’ the comments to analyse, have been publically attacking the same named people in the paper… (risking a perception of scores being settled by the researcher, with people that criticised their earlier work?!
one or more of the researchers have publically make it clear they ‘detest’ the people and have even said they are at ‘war’ with them (Marriott) that they are researching. This is generally, hopefully still frowned upon when researching human particpants.. ethics!
of course the fact that a number of quotes attributed (and intents attributed) are just wrong – other people made them not the person named, is just so lax as to be beyond incompetence
Lewandowsky says Frontiers told him to destroy all his correspondence in this affair, so naturally he has difficulty recalling all the issues.
“although we have destroyed all correspondence and documents involving the allegations against us at the request of Frontiers, and although now, a year later, our recollection of those events is minimal”
To refresh his memory: An email from Frontier’s to UWA dated 1 May 2013 as fallen into my hands:
“Frontiers has established a team consisting of senior academics, not Frontiers personnel, to evaluate the complaints made to Frontiers. ….We are striving to ensure the evaluation is robust, even-handed and objective….We are aware of the sensitivity of the whole question – we are indeed trying to steer our way through itand Frontiers has a totally neutral stance on the issues raised pending the outcome of the evaluation.”
The recommendation to retract was not an idiosyncratic publisher fiat, but in response to recommendations from an independent committee of senior academics. Of course Frontiers feels an obligation to protect the people who volunteered for this tricky task.
I am guessing this committee may have also identified a potential for bias in trying to engage in psychological analysis of people who are criticicising your work
Stephan Lewandowski and co-workers are interested in aspects of the behaviour of a certain population of H. sapiens. So they have set up a real-time experiment and they have measured the response of their study subjects.
“Unlike previous analyses of web content, the present project was conducted in “real time” as the response to LOG12 unfolded, thus permitting a fine-grained temporal analysis of the emerging global conversation.” (Lewandowski et al. 2013, Frontiers in Psychology 4, currently retracted).
All study subjects of the population were totally free to ignore the experiment and the whole research project was conducted in a public area. All study subjects were fully aware that they did their statements in a public area.
Stephan Lewandowski and co-workers have made the choice to publish their findings in a peer-reviewed journal (Frontiers in Psychology), and they have made the choice to publish their findings very quickly. They could also have made the choice to publish their findings in a newspaper / magazine / oral presentation (etc.), and they could also have made the choice to publish their findings after a delay of let say 20 or 50 or 100 years.
“How to write a manuscript that will have maximal impact” is a quote of Ushma S. Neill (2007, http://www.jci.org/articles/view/34288 ). Stephan Lewandowski and co-workers can be congratulated that they have reached this goal.
Klass
he ethics approval for the ‘research’ said ‘observe’ and ‘no direct participation of any sort’..
yet Marriott (and Lewandowsky, Cook) was directly interacting with people named in the paper, insulting them, goading them , during the research period..
look at the 5 comments under the new statement
“All study subjects of the population were totally free to ignore the experiment and the whole research project was conducted in a public area. All study subjects were fully aware that they did their statements in a public area.”
Where the study objects aware that such an experiment was going on? Were there objective criteria to catagorize the reactions? Did the researchers quote verbatim without changing the context? Were the researchers professionals, neutral and objective in their categorizing?
I don’t think that the subjects would object to publishing this study in a newspaper or a blog, as they have all the means to react in public in the same way. But publishing in a scientific journal asks for very high standards which I doubt were met in this case. That the controversy has a huge impact is sure, but that doesn’t show that the authors are right, only that they sought maximum publicity.
Klaas van Dijk: “Stephan Lewandowski and co-workers are interested in aspects of the behaviour of a certain population of H. sapiens. So they have set up a real-time experiment and they have measured the response of their study subjects”
I would say he would claim that his research falls under the moniker ” observation of public behavior”. Definitely not an experiment, because an experiment would require full IRB approval of the research protocol actually used as well as informed consent.
I think Lewandowsky might make the argument that “observation of public behavior” is exempt from the provisions of IRB review and informed consent. However, this exemption does not apply when you disclose the identify of the subjects or when your disclosure can be “damaging to the subjects’ financial standing, employability, or reputation.” The relevant clauses are 46.101 (b) (2) (i) & (ii). See the link
http://www.hhs.gov/ohrp/humansubjects/guidance/45cfr46.html#46.101
The exception to this is when the individuals being observed do not meet the requirements for human subjects protection.
Because Lewandowsky interacted with his subjects, this research is not exempted from IRB review or from informed consent. See 46.102 (f) (1)
http://www.hhs.gov/ohrp/humansubjects/guidance/45cfr46.html#46.102
and the definition of interaction:
“Interaction includes communication or interpersonal contact between investigator and subject.”
Because there was interaction in the form of email between Lewandowsky and his subjects, these subjects are not exempted from 46.101 (b) (2) (i) & (ii).
Frontiers has already admitted by both retraction and reply that the paper was not valid, let its defenders post proof of validity rather than empty platitudes towards the authors and baseless condemnation on those who exposed its lack of merit.
No matter what the final outcome to this real drama is, one fact is for sure: the image of the authors and this publisher will be tarnished forever, provided that blogs remain free and open access indefinately. Like a coffee stain, once left to bake for some time, it is literally impossible to remove, no matter the quality or price of the bleach that you use.
Coming in to this thread rather late, I can summarize the whole issue in a very short post:
The original study was one thing, ignoring for the moment complaints about how subjects were recruited for the survey. The second study was another. From a highly superficial psychological point of view, one can analyze comments submitted to a web site for apparent personality traits (or even evidence of schizophrenia) and present the results in a scientifically valid fashion without identifying the people who submitted the comments. Not stripping that data from one’s database could lead to accusations that the publication violates the basic rules of privacy protection in human research. Thus, the retraction and a failure for the idea that climate-change deniers are crazy.
The entire episode is an unforced error for those who support the reality of climate change and a source of endless glee for “deniers.”
Conrad, “From a highly superficial psychological point of view, one can analyze comments submitted to a web site for apparent personality traits (or even evidence of schizophrenia) and present the results in a scientifically valid fashion . . . .” I don’t think they can be presented that way.
Henry Markram – Editor in Chief, Frontiers has added a comment to http://www.frontiersin.org/blog/Rights_of_Human_Subjects_in_Scientific_Papers/830
Henry Markram
My own personal opinion: The authors of the retracted paper and their followers are doing the climate change crisis a tragic disservice by attacking people personally and saying that it is ethically ok to identify them in a scientific study.
They made a monumental mistake, refused to fix it and that rightfully disqualified the study.
The planet is headed for a cliff and the scientific evidence for climate change is way past a debate, in my opinion. Why even debate this with contrarians? If scientists think there is a debate, then why not debate this scientifically? Why help the ostriches of society (always are) keep their heads in the sand? Why not focus even more on the science of climate change? Why not develop potential scenarios so that society can get prepared? Is that not what scientists do? Does anyone really believe that a public lynching will help advance anything? Who comes off as the biggest nutter? Activism that abuses science as a weapon is just not helpful at a time of crisis.
ref – “Who comes off as the biggest nutter? ”
Indeed!
ie John Cook, kept photoshopped pictures of himself as Himmler, with the Nazi badges and photo shopped and replaced with the Skeptical Science logo.. how do you think the ‘contrarians’ feel about being researched by John?
This is all about peoples perceptions and perhaps you have limited information.
Prof Lewandowsky, Michael Marriott and John Cook (founder of) are all involved with the Skeptical Science website. This website exists to attack ‘sceptics’. This has a private moderators forum called SKSforum.org which is owned and administered by John Cook (co-author of Fury) http://www.whois.com/whois/sksforum.org
A while back their images directory was made publically available( sloppy web admin, as google was able to cache it, NO hacking) wayback machine captured it here:
http://web.archive.org/web/20130806172838/http://www.sksforum.org/images/a11g0n3/
They eventually secured the forum, but not before the images were made widely seen by an utterly bemused ‘sceptical’ audience.
Copies have been stored at the WUWT website HerrCook: ( Himmler photoshopped with John’s face, note the attention to detail SkS logo on the cap badge, etc) http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2013/08/1_herrcook.jpg
and the 1930’s infamous Nuremburg rally photo, shopped with SkS logos on the flags! http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2013/08/skstroopers_marked.jpg
John Cook (co-author) also had photoshopped pictures mocking sceptics, including Anthony Watts (named in the Fury paper)
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2013/08/monkeys.jpg http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2013/08/weareskeptics1.jpg
So who are the ‘nutters’ here.
Frontiers have been blindsided by ‘researchers’ that are percieved to be political activists on the subject of climate change, setting a few scores with their opponents and critics. At least that is the perception many people have.
John Cook/Prof Lewandowsky are no doubt briefing Dana Nuccitelli (a Skeptical Science super admin, and author) about their side of the ‘story’ who is now using his Guardian blog to attack Frontiers…
Maybe Frontiers lawyers should check that agreement with the authors, very carefully, as Dana seems to be a proxy of the authors to attack Frontiers.
http://www.frontiersin.org/blog/rights_of_human_subjects_in_scientific_papers/830
This is the first time I’ve followed something on Retraction Watch. Do retractions often cause as many ructions and twists and turns – as is happening in the Lewandowsky case?
The latest statement from Henry Markram and subsequent counter claims from Lewandowsky’s associates today, would justify a new blog post in their own right!
Yes – it is very interesting.
The Authors have made yet another comment (dated 4/16/2014):
http://www.shapingtomorrowsworld.org/xp.html#3783
I would like to see the entire expert panel report released by Frontiers and/or the Authors.
Barry Woods:
“John Cook/Prof Lewandowsky are no doubt briefing Dana Nuccitelli (a Skeptical Science super admin, and author) about their side of the ‘story’ who is now using his Guardian blog to attack Frontiers…”
Just to add to that: Nuccitelli is promising in a below the line comment at the Guardian to reveal more soon. More of what, and from whom? It will be interesting to see. And Graham Readfearn of DeSmogBlog, who broke the retraction story before Frontiers’ official announcement, is also a Lewandowsky ally.
I hope some sociologist or philosopher of science is following these threads. I’m a strong believer in the explanatory power of the social sciences – a power which, like any other, must be exercised with the utmost care and discretion.
12 days later…has Nuccitelli revealed any “more”?
The Frontiers story has indeed entered a new phase:
http://rabett.blogspot.com/2014/04/amway-science.html
http://cassandralegacy.blogspot.com/2014/04/recursive-fury-reasons-of-frontiers.html
This incident now has its own Downfall parody on youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bL_QWRgj_-k