The authors of a 2018 paper on how noisy distractions disrupt memory are retracting the article after finding a flaw in their study. The paper, “Unexpected events disrupt visuomotor working memory and increase guessing,” appeared in Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, a publication of the Psychonomic Society. (For those keeping score at home, psychonomics is the … Continue reading Distraction paper pulled for clerical error
The authors of a 2017 paper on emotional and behavioral gaps between boys and girls have retracted the article after discovering a coding error that completely undermined their conclusions. The revelation prompted the researchers to republish their findings in the same journal, this time with a title that flips the narrative. The PsychJournal study, first … Continue reading Boys will be boys: Data error prompts U-turn on study of sex differences in school
Several years ago, a group of four chemists believed they had stumbled upon evidence that contradicted a fairly well-established model in fluid dynamics. Between 2013 and 2015, the researchers published a series of four papers detailing their results — two in ACS Macro Letters and two in Macromolecules. Timothy P. Lodge, the journals’ editor and a distinguished professor … Continue reading Chemistry papers challenged a paradigm — until the authors spotted a pivotal error
A rheumatology journal has retracted a paper about treating knee pain after an institutional investigation found a mistake in the statistical process. Over several months, the authors proposed a series of corrections to the 2014 study. However, the journal Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases (ARD) decided that there were “unresolved concerns” about the reliability of the data, and … Continue reading Against authors’ wishes, journal pulls study with errors, statistical mistake
We’re pleased to present a guest post from Michèle B. Nuijten, a PhD student at Tilburg University who helped develop a program called “statcheck,” which automatically spots statistical mistakes in psychology papers, making it significantly easier to find flaws. Nuijten writes about how such a program came about, and its implications for other fields. Readers … Continue reading Making error detection easier – and more automated: A guest post from the co-developer of “statcheck”
The Cochrane Library has withdrawn a criticized 2014 meta-analysis about a technique to help young people avoid alcohol abuse, because of “major errors.” The review found that motivational interviewing, a form of counseling to help people change behaviors, showed some effects but had “no substantive, meaningful benefits” in preventing alcohol abuse among people 25 and younger. … Continue reading Cochrane withdraws criticized alcohol misuse report for “major errors”
It turns out a 2014 paper that found a surprising pattern of plant migration in response to global warming was not so surprising after all — it’s been retracted by the authors due to a mistake in the statistical analysis. Most studies on migrating populations have found that species around the globe move north to escape the rising … Continue reading Stats error has chilling effect on global warming paper
The authors of a 2014 paper on soccer injuries have forfeited their publication after revealing that the foundation of the work was based on faulty data. (Look, we could have written about letting air out of balls, yadda yadda, but the Super Bowl has come and gone.) The article, which appeared in the Journal of … Continue reading He shoots, he…misses! Soccer injury paper gets red card for data errors
The author of a controversial 2009 paper arguing that at least some amount of global warming could lead to economic gains has corrected the paper, along with a later article in a different journal. We confess to be baffled by the implications of the mix-up, although others appear to be less confused. The 2009 article, … Continue reading “Gremlins” caused errors in climate change paper showing gains from global warming
Last month, we brought you the story of two retractions by Yale’s Laurie Santos because the team discovered errors in the way the first author had coded the data. That first author, Neha Mahajan, took full responsibility for the coding problems, according to the retraction notices, and a university investigation cleared her of any “intentional, … Continue reading Psychology researcher explains how retraction-causing errors led to change in her lab