ArticlePloS one2017
Questionable research practices among italian research psychologists.
Article in PloS one, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 40 papers, 3 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
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The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
40 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- The influence of journal submission guidelines on authors' reporting of statistics and use of open research practices: Five years later.Behavior research methods · 2023Pooled it
- Prevalence of Research Misconduct and Questionable Research Practices: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.Science and engineering ethics · 2021Pooled it
- Is the Psychopathic Brain an Artifact of Coding Bias? A Systematic Review.Frontiers in psychology · 2021Pooled it
- Biomedical doctoral students' research practices when facing dilemmas: two vignette-based randomized control trials.Scientific reports · 2023Trial
- Assessing Questionable and Responsible Research Practices in Psychology Master's Theses.Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
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- What is critical metascience and why is it important?Frontiers in psychology · 2026Review
- The effect of manuscript characteristics on quality assessment of scientific manuscripts in psychology.PloS one · 2026Article
- Estimating the Replicability of Sports and Exercise Science Research.Sports medicine (Auckland, N.Z.) · 2025Article
- Poor hypotheses and research waste in biology: learning from a theory crisis in psychology.BMC biology · 2025Review
- A Systematic Review on the Evolution of Power Analysis Practices in Psychological Research.Psychologica Belgica · 2025Article
- Correcting for outcome reporting bias in a meta-analysis: A meta-regression approach.Behavior research methods · 2024Article
- Questionable research practices of medical and dental faculty in Pakistan - a confession.BMC medical ethics · 2024Article
- Article
- The replication crisis has led to positive structural, procedural, and community changes.Communications psychology · 2023Review
- Method Reporting with Initials for Transparency (MeRIT) promotes more granularity and accountability for author contributions.Nature communications · 2023Article
- Proposal of a Selection Protocol for Replication of Studies in Sports and Exercise Science.Sports medicine (Auckland, N.Z.) · 2023Article
- Article
- What do participants think of our research practices? An examination of behavioural psychology participants' preferences.Royal Society open science · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
A survey in the United States revealed that an alarmingly large percentage of university psychologists admitted having used questionable research practices that can contaminate the research literature with false positive and biased findings. We conducted a replication of this study among Italian research psychologists to investigate whether these findings generalize to other countries. All the original materials were translated into Italian, and members of the Italian Association of Psychology were invited to participate via an online survey. The percentages of Italian psychologists who admitted to having used ten questionable research practices were similar to the results obtained in the United States although there were small but significant differences in self-admission rates for some QRPs. Nearly all researchers (88%) admitted using at least one of the practices, and researchers generally considered a practice possibly defensible if they admitted using it, but Italian researchers were much less likely than US researchers to consider a practice defensible. Participants' estimates of the percentage of researchers who have used these practices were greater than the self-admission rates, and participants estimated that researchers would be unlikely to admit it. In written responses, participants argued that some of these practices are not questionable and they have used some practices because reviewers and journals demand it. The similarity of results obtained in the United States, this study, and a related study conducted in Germany suggest that adoption of these practices is an international phenomenon and is likely due to systemic features of the international research and publication processes.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.