Читать книгу Health Psychology - Michael Murray - Страница 142

Replication is one of the most important research methods in existence. Yet it is hardly used or mentioned in textbooks about research methods. Replication refers to the attempt by an investigator to repeat a study purely to determine whether the original findings can be repeated. Essentially, the researcher wants to know whether the original findings are reliable or whether they have been produced by some combination of chance or spurious factors. If study findings can be replicated, then they can be accepted as reliable and valuable to knowledge and understanding. However, if the findings of a study cannot be replicated, then the findings cannot be accepted as a genuine contribution to knowledge.

Lack of replication has been a bone of contention in many areas of psychology, including health psychology. Traditionally, a low priority has been given to replication of other researchers’ results. Perhaps researchers believe that they will not be perceived as sufficiently creative if they replicate somebody else’s research. In a similar vein, journal editors do not give replications of research – especially failed replications – the same priority as novel findings. This bias towards new positive results, and away from failed replications, produces a major distortion in the academic literature. Lack of replication before publication is the main reason for the so-called ‘Repeatability Crisis’ in psychology and other disciplines.