Can large language models stand in for human participants? Many social scientists seem to think so, and are already using "silicon samples" in research. One problem: depending on the analytic decisions made, you can basically get these samples to show any effect you want. THREAD 🧵

Read: www.researchgate.net/publication/... Thanks, Anna Dreber & economist team that made this a reality, & @PRASAC for taking lead. Main question: Can prediction markets and surveys accurately predict if classic social psychology & JDM findings will replicate in new data collections?

Did you register to help moderate PsyArXiv preprints but haven’t heard from us yet? Check your spam folder and add [email protected] to your contacts! We are onboarding moderators in batches to avoid overloading the system, but rest assured we will get to everyone. #PsychSciSky

New 📰 Demand characteristics are a fundamental methodological concern in research with humans Yet little is known about the magnitude and consistency of these effects In a new paper, I, M. Wyatt, and @mcxfrank.bsky.social take stock of what we’ve learned via meta-analysis doi.org/10.1525/coll...

If you consume or produce research, I say that you must learn about the commercial publishing system. Start with @forrt.bsky.social's glossary (forrt.org/glossary/eng...), watch the Paywall Movie (www.youtube.com/watch?v=zAzT...) and learn about OA types. Think about who you want to do research for.

In @natrevpsychol.nature.com, Team Scientists @szaszibarnabas.bsky.social, @dggoldst.bsky.social & @dilipsoman.bsky.social and Susan Michie argue that improving how we study nudges—through better design, collaboration, and open science—can help us learn when and where they’re most effective.

Here's a quick blogpost about alternative publishing models. You can bring a horse to water, and indeed wave the bucket temptingly under its nose, but it is likely to gallop off elsewhere. deevybee.blogspot.com/2025/07/new-... @ec.europa.eu @wellcometrust.bsky.social

🧵 Can you predict whether behavioral interventions will work in new contexts? … probably not, right? In our new paper with @dggoldst.bsky.social @dilipsoman.bsky.social @susanmichie.bsky.social, we dive into how to better understand and improve generalizability. rdcu.be/ewD2z Summary👇

New paper just dropped: Szaszi, Barnabas, Daniel G. Goldstein, Dilip Soman, Susan Michie. (2025). Generalizability of Choice Architecture Interventions. Nature Reviews Psychology. Thanks to @szaszibarnabas.bsky.social for doing the lion's share! www.nature.com/articles/s44...

Day 2 of #SIPS2025 ended with a fabulous boat trip! I’ve been told that SIPSers took part in traditional Hungarian dances led by @martonkovacs.bsky.social and @szaszibarnabas.bsky.social . But what happened on the boat, stays on the boat. Tss!

HELP! 🙏 I’m looking for validated emotionally neutral texts (ideally pretested or normed) to use in a control condition. Participants will read the text and count letters. Any leads, references, or resources? 🙏

This is shocking behaviour by Wiley; the stated justification does not stand up. I will not be doing any peer review for Wiley journals in future.

PCI Psychology is here!! 🎉🥳 After over a year of hard work by so many people, we are thrilled to announce that we are open for submissions! Join us in making publishing more efficient, equitable, and open: psych.peercommunityin.org #PsychSciSky #scipub

A recently published meta-analysis in Nature Human Behaviour "found evidence supporting the efficacy of social comparison as a behaviour change technique in shaping behaviour in the desired direction". I was curious, so I re-analyzed the manuscript, but the funnel plots below say it all.

US brain drain: Nature’s guide to the initiatives drawing scientists abroad “the ERC is doubling to up to €2 million (US$2.2 million) the extra ‘start-up’ money that researchers moving to Europe can apply for to help them establish their laboratories.” #AcademicSky #ERC #US #Researchers

Please help us on our next big behavioral study on parental well-being!

What is the future of Open Science? Join @annemscheel.bsky.social @nicholascoles.bsky.social @szaszibarnabas.bsky.social @aufdroeseler.bsky.social and @stephaniemlee.bsky.social for an exciting discussion during the Keynote Panel at the #SIPS2025 Online.

I was sent a paper to review that cites a book I did not write. As in, it cites a made up book with my name on it. Quick look in the references, and I quickly found several more non-existent papers. People. People. This is supposed to be science. What are we doing? This made my soul feel tired.

What is the future of Open Science? Join @annemscheel.bsky.social @nicholascoles.bsky.social @szaszibarnabas.bsky.social @aufdroeseler.bsky.social and @stephaniemlee.bsky.social for an exciting discussion during the Keynote Panel at the #SIPS2025 Online.

I recently pre-tested forty and used thirty "facts" like that for class exercise about preconceived notions. The one most of of my psych students bought was "Brain drain: A smartphone lying on the table reduces attention span." Alas: x.com/rubenarslan/...

EADM is now on BlueSky. We will post about JDM news, papers, and events (like spudm2025.imtlucca.it, see you there)

New paper from the Neurosurgery Research Team at BCM! "Learning and language in the unconscious human hippocampus" www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

A new prologue episode! Who first made the claim that more than 50% of published findings might not be true? It was Neher, 1967! We read his full paper as preparation for next week, where we will critically discuss Ioannidis, 2005, repeating this claim. nulliusinverba.podbean.com/e/prologus-5...

🌍 We are launching a new #ManyLabs!!! Join the Heat & Cognition project! We're studying how extreme heat affects human thinking, social behavior & well-being — globally. Contribute & co-author: 🔗 Info: heatandmind.wordpress.com 📋 Sign up: www.soscisurvey.de/HeatandCogni... #EnvironmentalPsychology

Looking for basic inference course/book designed for people who won't go to do research, e.g., business undergrads Practical, no math Measurement error, metric choice, regression to the mean, causality<-Yes Matrices, theorems, rich<-No I want not just simple (e.g., cartoon guide) But practical

Excited to kick off the #SPSP2025 Happiness & Well-Being Preconference today! 🎉✨ We’ve got an incredible lineup: the Global Happiness Megastudy 🌍, a taxonomy of positive mental health 🧠, The Global Flourishing Study 🌱, & Flourish Science 🤖 (a happiness AI coach!) Let’s go! #WellBeing 😃

Universities in the UK and US, facing declining government support, will not renew expensive deals with Elsevier and others. Scholars need to support low cost journals! See e.g. freejournals.org, which is looking for new board members.

The visa and ESTA of my two PhD students has been rejected so they cant come to #SPSP2025 with me. If you are there and want to talk about behsci interventions, generalizability, happiness, megastudies, contact me so I won’t feel so alone! Also, check out my talk about our Happines Megastudy!

Our new study was just published in Nature! In Michigan, we find a large and persistent racial excellence gap over time. Socio-economic status explains one-third of the racial disparity in top academic achievement while school factors only explain about 1/10th. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Friends, I have written you a book on forensic metascience. It is free. You can have it. Happy St. Valentine's Day. If you wish to give me a gift back, you can use it to cause trouble - the greatest gift of all. open.substack.com/pub/jamescla...

After my first year as EiC of Collabra: Psychology, I wrote an editorial with my reflections so far. Featured are some observations about submission triage, author geolocation data, and a registered revisions experiment. @collabrapsychology.bsky.social @improvingpsych.org doi.org/10.1525/coll...

Anyone who happened to know that the White House would announce and then suspend tariffs within 24 hours just made a boatload of money.

The present and future of peer review: Ideas, interventions, and evidence www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

New preprint "Decision Making Under Extinction Risk" with Adam Harris, David Kellen, and @singmann.bsky.social. osf.io/preprints/ps...

Our global study on the state of trust in scientists is now out in Nature Human Behaviour! 🥳 With a team of 241 researchers, we surveyed 71,922 people in 68 countries, providing the largest dataset on trust in scientists post-pandemic 👇🧵https://www.nature.com/articles/s41562-024-02090-5

People, just stop doing Frontiers special issues. Find a nice diamond open access journal, and self-publish and collaboratively peer review the set of papers you all want to write. Do not give Frontiers money. They add no value. If anything, they hurt your reputation. MDPI is of course even worse.

So, who is coming to #SIPS2025? Don't miss it! It will be the 10th SIPS, so we will come together to evaluate the reform and gather new momentum to improve science. Day 0: Sightseeing, hiking dinner: on a boat on the Danube Let others know that you are coming to Budapest so they can meet you!

come to join my great colleagues in Prague! check some of our studies at im.vse.cz/cevyz/englis... from qualitative study of perceptions of dishonesty experiments doi.org/10.1080/1350... to effects of tax designation doi.org/10.1016/j.je... & more!

"A study of federally funded research projects in the United States estimated that principal investigators spend on average about 45% of their time on administrative activities related to applying for and managing projects rather than conducting active research" www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Happy New Year! For those of you who make New Year's Resolutions, 99 (12.5%) of the 787 longest running streaks (all over 8 years in duration) started on January 1. (Second most frequent starting date: 12/31 with 19) #FreshStart @katymilkman.bsky.social

I don’t like to give advice to PhDs, in part because I felt like I got tons of conflicting advice myself, but… … a PhD takes at least 4 years, a timeframe likely encompassing considerable AI gains. I would tell them to think in advance about what things it will change & how to use them in you favor

@pedromics.bsky.social Straight to my Data Analysis slides.

📣 I'm #hiring a 3-year #postdoc! - Live anywhere in the United States! - Improve #decisionMaking and #wellbeing with #quantitative #cogSci. Share the application URL here and elsewhere.👇 geisinger.wd5.mywork...#hiring#postdoc!#decisionMaking#wellbeing#quantitative#cogSci.ers can be sent to me with "R-69755" in the subject line.

Dear academics We could dramatically reduce our administrative workload if we all just agreed not to ask for reference letters until we made our list of finalists. This is massive collective action problem has already been solved by… *checks notes* …every other industry on earth.

People in 26 countries prefer more control over their online environment

 In a conjoint study (N = 11,868), we explored preferences for regulating online environments by examining binary choices between different regulation scenarios. Preprint:https://osf.io/preprints/osf/haqu9

Thanks Uri!

I'm reviewing a 20 page grant proposal in Overleaf. It needs language some light editing. I find that chatgpt is good in this but needs my interaction to review changes it makes (thats okay) Any suggestion re workflow? (I had tried writefull in the past, but did not like it.) Thanks #EconSky

Publishing in journals has become so slow, painful, and expensive that not a single day goes by when I don’t think about abandoning it altogether. We could do so much more if we just preprinted and moved on.

All my work is open - and you can use images from it without seeking my permission as long as it is correctly cited. Every week I get requests in relation to COM-B or the Behaviour Change Wheel. No need to request- the answer is always yes! #OpenScience

New preprint!