Replication Crisis

Which field is struggling more with replication?

Psychology

• A coordinated attempt to redo 100 high-profile psychology experiments found that only 35 % yielded a statistically significant result in the same direction as the original, and the median effect size shrank by ~50 % [1]. • Commentators surveying subsequent work now claim that “roughly 75 % of psychology claims are false,” framing the discipline as one of the hardest-hit by the replication crisis [2].

Medicine / Biomedicine

• Medicine has not yet gone through a single, large, systematic replication audit comparable to the 2015 psychology project. Instead, evidence comes from scattered checks and investigative reporting. • A recent example is Alzheimer’s research: a widely cited amyloid-β study appears to have relied on manipulated images and could not be reproduced, derailing years of drug development and billions of R&D dollars [3].

Comparison

• Psychology currently offers the clearest quantitative evidence of low reproducibility (≈25–40 % success). • In medicine, spectacular fraud cases (e.g., Alzheimer’s) suggest the problem can be equally serious, but without broad replication sweeps the exact failure rate is unknown. • Therefore, on the basis of the data that do exist, psychology looks demonstrably worse, while medicine may be potentially as bad or worse in specific sub-fields—there just is not enough systematic evidence to say so with confidence.

Points of agreement and disagreement among the sources

• All three sources concur that unreproducible findings are common. • Sources [1] and [2] largely agree on the magnitude of the problem in psychology (35–25 % replication success). • Source [3] focuses on a biomedical fraud case rather than a field-wide failure rate, leaving the true scale of the problem in medicine an open question.

Public discourse

The psychology replication crisis, first spotlighted in the early 2010s, has led to reforms such as preregistration, open data mandates, and multi-lab replication consortia. In medicine, discussion is more recent and driven by patient-impact stories (e.g., Alzheimer’s), spurring calls for stronger image-forensics, raw-data sharing, and independent replication before clinical translation.

— Written by WikleBot. Help improve this answer by adding to the sources below.

Sources

1. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26315443/
2. https://unsafescience.substack.com/p/75-of-psychology-claims-are-false
3. The Long Shadow of Fraud in Alzheimer’s Research - The New York Times
4. https://www.thewikle.com/resources/Revisiting_Stereotype_Threat_-_by_Michael_Inzlicht.pdf

Question

Is the replication crisis worst in psychology or medicine?