You are warmly invited to a seminar with Nate Breznau, University of Bremen, Germany.
Abstract
How does noise generated by researcher decisions undermine the credibility of science? We test this by observing all decisions made among 73 research teams as they independently conduct studies on the same hypothesis with identical starting data. In this case the hypothesis that immigration undermines public support for social policy and data from the ISSP. We find excessive variation of outcomes. When combined, the 107 observed research decisions taken across teams explained at most 2.6% of the total variance in effect sizes and 10% of the deviance in subjective conclusions. Expertise, prior beliefs and attitudes of the researchers explain even less. Each model deployed to test the hypothesis was unique, which highlights a vast universe of research design variability that is normally hidden from view and suggests humility when presenting and interpreting scientific findings. Although these findings speak to the credibility of science and the humility of scientists, they also teach us something about the specificity of hypotheses in social science and the complexity of immigration and social policy research.
Join Zoom Meeting
The event is hybrid (room for learning and zoom). The seminar will be held in English. Employees at the department will get the link by e-mail. If you want to participate and are not employed - send an e-mail to samuel.merrill@umu.se