(This article was originally published at Statistical Modeling, Causal Inference, and Social Science, and syndicated at StatsBlogs.)
Justin Pickett sends along this paper he wrote with Sean Roche:
Data fraud and selective reporting both present serious threats to the credibility of science. However, there remains considerable disagreement among scientists about how best to sanction data fraud, and about the ethicality of selective reporting.
OK, let’s move away from asking scientists. Let’s ask the general public:
The public is arguably the largest stakeholder in the reproducibility of science; research is primarily paid for with public funds, and flawed science threatens the public’s welfare. Members of the public are able to make rapid but meaningful judgments about the morality of different behaviors using moral intuitions.
Pickett and Roche did a couple surveys:
We conducted two studies—a survey experiment with a nationwide convenience sample (N = 821), and a follow-up survey with a representative sample of US adults (N = 964)—to explore public judgments about the morality of data fraud and selective reporting in science.
What did they find?
The public overwhelming judges both data fraud and selective reporting as morally wrong, and supports a range of serious sanctions for these behaviors. Most notably, the vast majority of Americans support criminalizing data fraud, and many also believe the offense deserves a sentence of incarceration.
We know from other surveys that people generally feel that, if there’s something they don’t like, that it should be illegal. And are pretty willing to throw wrongdoers into prison. So, in that general sense, this isn’t so surprising. Still interesting to see it in this particular case.
As Evelyn Beatrice Hall never said, I disapprove of your questionable research practices, but I will defend to the death your right to publish their fruits in PPNAS and have them featured on NPR.
P.S. Just to be clear on this, I’m just reporting on an article that someone sent me. I don’t think people should be sent to prison for data fraud and selective reporting. Not unless they also commit real crimes that are serious.
P.P.S. Best comment comes from Shravan and AJG:
Ask the respondent what you think the consequences should be if
– you commit data fraud
– your coauthor commits data fraud
– your biggest rival commits data fraud
Then average these responses.
The post “Most notably, the vast majority of Americans support criminalizing data fraud, and many also believe the offense deserves a sentence of incarceration.” appeared first on Statistical Modeling, Causal Inference, and Social Science.
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