The earlier responders make some good points but......I have seen plotted
regression lines when the rsquare was 0.005, scatterplots where two
"populations were separated by a line that makes a southern gerrrymander
envious, where clusters had fewer than 3 members, etc. etc. The whole thing
would be funny but these journal articles are used to make policy, affect
legislation, etc. there is hell to pay if a chemist misreads a spectrum or a
geologist confuses east from west. My feelingis that most egregious stuff
should be recognized by a "comment" in the journal. Sending in a comment to a
journal is also a good learning experience for the student in that she have to
be really sure it is a blooper and that the blooper makes a difference in the
conclusions.
Lise DeShea wrote:
> List Members:
>
> I teach statistics and experimental design at the University of Kentucky,
> and I give journal articles to my students occasionally with instructions
> to identify what kind of research was conducted, what the independent and
> dependent variables were, etc. For my advanced class, I ask them to
> identify anything that the researcher did incorrectly.
>
> As an example, there was an article in a recent issue of an APA journal
> where the researchers randomly assigned participants to one of six
> conditions in a 2x3 factorial design. The N wouldn't allow equal cell
> sizes, and the reported df exceeded N. Yet the article said the
> researchers ran a two-way fixed-effects ANOVA.
>
> One of my students wrote on her homework, "It is especially hard to know
> when you are doing something wrong when journals allow bad examples of
> research to be published on a regular basis."
>
> I'd like to hear what other list members think about this problem and
> whether there are solutions that would not alienate journal editors. (As a
> relative new assistant professor, I can't do that or I'll never get
> published, I'll be denied tenure, and I'll have to go out on the street
> corners with a sign that says, "Will Analyze Data For Food.")
>
> Cheers.
> Lise
> ~~~
> Lise DeShea, Ph.D.
> Assistant Professor
> Educational and Counseling Psychology Department
> University of Kentucky
> 245 Dickey Hall
> Lexington KY 40506
> Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Phone: (859) 257-9884
>
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