Why ear plugs are great for clubbing and concerts
I enjoy clubbing and pop/rock concerts exclusively with my ear plugs in. Does that mean I miss out? No, I enjoy the music exactly as it is meant to be.
new post just out: The growing divide between higher and low impact scientific journals
Ten years ago the Public Library of Science started one big lower impact and a series of smaller higher impact journals. Over the years these publication outlets diverged. The growing divide between standard and top journals might mirror wider trends in scholarly publishing.
https://brainsidea.wordpress.com/…/the-growing-divide-betw…/
The slowing down of the biggest scientific journal
PLoS ONE started 11 years ago to disruptively change scholarly publishing. By now it is the biggest scientific journal out there. Why has it become so slow?
https://brainsidea.wordpress.com/…/the-slowing-down-of-the…/
Do twitter or facebook activity influence scientific impact?
Are scientists smart when they promote their work on social media? Isn’t this a waste of time, time which could better be spent in the lab running experiments? No. An analysis of all available articles published by PLoS journals suggests otherwise.
https://brainsidea.wordpress.com/…/do-twitter-or-facebook-…/
Why does music training increase intelligence?
We know that music training causes intelligence to increase, but why? In this post I 1) propose a new theory, and 2) falsify it immediately. Given that this particular combination of activities is unpublishable in any academic journal, I invite you to read the whole story here (in under 500 words).
https://brainsidea.wordpress.com/…/why-does-music-training…/
The curious effect of a musical rhythm on us
Do you know the feeling of a musical piece moving you? What is this feeling? One common answer by psychological researchers is that what you feel is your attention moving in sync with the music. In a new paper I show that this explanation is mistaken.
https://brainsidea.wordpress.com/…/the-curious-effect-of-a…/
HOW TO WRITE A NATURE STYLE REVIEW
Nature Reviews Neuroscience is one of the foremost journals in neuroscience. What do its articles look like? How have they developed? This blog post provides answers which might guide you in writing your own reviews.
https://brainsidea.wordpress.com/…/how-to-write-a-nature-s…/
DISCOVERING A GLARING ERROR IN A RESEARCH PAPER – A PERSONAL ACCOUNT
New York Magazine has published a great article about how grad student Steven Ludeke tried to correct mistakes in the research of Pete Hatemi and Brad Verhulst. Overall, Ludeke summarises his experience as ‘not recommendable’. Back in my undergraduate years I spotted an error in an article by David DeMatteo and did little to correct it. Why?
https://brainsidea.wordpress.com/…/discovering-a-glaring-e…/
HOW TO EXCEL AT ACADEMIC CONFERENCES IN 5 STEPS
https://brainsidea.wordpress.com/…/how-to-excel-at-academi…/
HOW TO TEST FOR MUSIC SKILLS
In a new article I evaluate a recently developed test for music listening skills. To my great surprise the test behaves very well. This could open the path to better understand the psychology underlying music listening. Why am I surprised?
https://brainsidea.wordpress.com/…/how-to-test-for-music-s…/
A critical comment on “Contextual sensitivity in scientific reproducibility”
Psychological science is surprisingly difficult to replicate (Open Science Collaboration, 2015). Researchers are desperate to find out why. A new study in the prestigious journal PNAS (Van Bavel et al., 2016) claims that unknown contextual factors of psychological phenomena (“hidden moderators”) are to blame. The more an effect is sensitive to unknown contextual factors, the less likely a successful replication is. In this blog post I will lay out why I am not convinced by this argument.
https://brainsidea.wordpress.com/…/a-critical-comment-on-c…/
new post just out:
Yet more evidence for questionable research practices in original studies of Reproducibility Project: Psychology
The replicability of psychological research is surprisingly low. Why? In this blog post I present new evidence showing that questionable research practices contributed to failures to replicate psychological effects.
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I wrote an article for AEON magazine. Check it out:
https://aeon.co/…/how-the-orchestra-is-arranged-by-the-biol…
10 THINGS I LEARNED WHILE WORKING FOR THE DUTCH SCIENCE FUNDING COUNCIL (NWO)
The way science is currently funded is very controversial. During the last 6 months I was on a break from my PhD and worked for the organisation funding science in the Netherlands (NWO). These are 10 insights I gained.
https://brainsidea.wordpress.com/…/10-things-i-learned-whi…/
IS REPLICABILITY IN ECONOMICS BETTER THAN IN PSYCHOLOGY?
Colin Camerer and colleagues recently published a Science article on the replicability of behavioural economics. ‘It appears that there is some difference in replication success’ between psychology and economics, they write, given their reproducibility rate of 61% and psychology’s of 36%. I took a closer look at the data to find out whether there really are any substantial differences between fields.
https://brainsidea.wordpress.com/…/replicability-in-econom…/
PSYCHOLOGICAL RESEARCHERS NEED TO CHANGE THEIR PRACTICES: HERE’S WHY
Why is a surprising amount of psychological research unreplicable? Psychology calls itself a science but often falls short on the replication test of scientific merit. I took a closer look at the data to find out why. The journal Psychonomic Bulletin and Review will publish the findings very soon, but the accepted pre-print is already available now (download it here). The take-home message is that psychology just cannot go on like this.
