The New York Times has detailed coverage of the political science gay canvasser scandal. Critics said the intense competition by graduate students to be published in prestigious journals, weak oversight by academic advisers and the rush by journals to publish studies that will attract attention too often led to sloppy and even unethical research methods. The now disputed study was covered by The...
Science retracts study on gay canvassers because it was fake!
This is indeed a very big deal, as Science is the top science journal in the world, and the senior author is a well-respected political scientist. The study was published last December in Science, and received lots of media attention. It found that a 20-minute, one-on-one conversation with a gay political canvasser could steer voters in favor of same-sex marriage. Not only that, but these changed...
Republicans and North Carolina higher ed: “Winter is coming”
A right-leaning public policy foundation is making waves in North Carolina’s public university system. The Chronicle of Higher Education reports on how the John William Pope Center for Higher Education Policy is getting traction among the state’s Republican political leadership. The Center, the Chronicle tells us, aims to “[make] public colleges more accountable to the public, by holding them to...
How to administer course evaluations
—Hand out evaluation forms when the most irascible student in class is absent. —Be sure that the only assignment you give right before the evaluation is a low-stakes one. “Have them write an easy paper where they can talk about themselves and their journey in the class,” Ms. Wilson advises. And never give back a graded assignment on evaluation day. —Don’t leave the classroom while the evaluations...
“The new Jews of Harvard”
The title of an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal: In practice, however, there is strong evidence that racial balance is the highest priority at schools like Harvard, and holistic admissions are used to obscure the racial bean-counting necessary to obtain the desired racial mix. At the California Institute of Technology, a selective private college that uses color-blind admissions, Asian...
How to de-Google your life
Imagine you get a letter in the post offering you free water. Instead of paying Irish Water for your supply, another company promises you a generous quantity of free water. The catch? Instead of water meters, the company wants to install meters measuring the comings and goings to your home. They will also record who you know, who you communicate with and how often. They will store information on...
Compelling evidence that broken windows theory of crime is true
What is “broken windows“? The broken windows theory is a criminological theory of the norm-setting and signaling effect of urban disorder and vandalism on additional crime and anti-social behavior. The theory states that maintaining and monitoring urban environments to prevent small crimes such as vandalism, public drinking and toll-jumping helps to create an atmosphere of order and...
Data on female serial killers
Female serial killers are more rare than their male counterparts, but they aren’t nonexistent; about one in six serial murderers is a woman. […] She and her colleagues started at murderpedia.org, an online encyclopedia of serial killers and mass murderers. They ultimately identified sixty-four female serial killers who were active between 1821 and 2008. The researchers then used reputable...
I have no choice but to reject the validity of the scientific method
Are the benefits of moderate drinking a myth? A full review of the relevant epidemiological literature on moderate drinking is beyond the scope of this document. However, an initial scan leaves me reasonably confident that tax increases save lives in the long run too. The reasons: No randomized trials have checked on the benefits of moderate drinking (Holmes et al. 2014, p. 4). The belief in such...
John Oliver on standardized testing
Pretty hilarious:
And Pearson responds: