"Positive" Results Increase Down the Hierarchy of the Sciences
"Positive" Results Increase Down the Hierarchy of the Sciences
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DOI：
10.1371/journal.pone.0010068
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发表时间：
2010-04-07
期刊：
影响因子：
3.7
通讯作者：
Fanelli, Daniele
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Fanelli, Daniele
自然科学在最上面，社会科学在最下面，生物科学在中间，这种科学等级的假设已经有近200年的历史了。这种秩序是直观的，反映在学术生活的许多特征中，但它是否反映了科学研究的“硬度”——即：研究问题和结果在多大程度上是由数据和理论决定的，而不是由非认知因素决定的，这是有争议的。这项研究分析了所有学科发表的2434篇论文，这些论文宣称已经验证了一个假设。确定有多少论文报告了对测试假设的“积极”（全部或部分）或“消极”支持。如果层次假设是正确的，那么“软”科学的研究人员应该对他们有意识和无意识的偏见有更少的约束，因此报告更多积极的结果。结果证实了所考虑的所有层次的预测：学科、领域和广泛定义的方法。控制纯学科和应用学科之间观察到的差异，以及测试一个或几个假设的论文之间的差异，心理学和精神病学以及经济和商业学科的论文报告阳性结果的几率比空间科学高5倍左右，社会科学领域的论文比物理科学高2.3倍。在人类身上应用行为和社会方法的研究比在非生物材料上进行物理和化学研究高出3.4倍。在所有的比较中，生物学研究具有中间值。这些结果表明，所测试的假设的性质以及用于测试假设的逻辑和方法的严谨性在不同学科和领域有系统的不同，这取决于主题的复杂性和可能的其他因素（例如，一个领域的历史和/或智力发展水平）。另一方面，这些结果表明，当社会科学采用科学方法进行发现时，它们与自然科学的区别只是程度上的不同，从而支持了社会科学的科学地位，反对社会科学完全是主观的主张。
The hypothesis of a Hierarchy of the Sciences with physical sciences at the top, social sciences at the bottom, and biological sciences in-between is nearly 200 years old. This order is intuitive and reflected in many features of academic life, but whether it reflects the "hardness" of scientific research-i.e., the extent to which research questions and results are determined by data and theories as opposed to non-cognitive factors-is controversial. This study analysed 2434 papers published in all disciplines and that declared to have tested a hypothesis. It was determined how many papers reported a "positive" (full or partial) or "negative" support for the tested hypothesis. If the hierarchy hypothesis is correct, then researchers in "softer" sciences should have fewer constraints to their conscious and unconscious biases, and therefore report more positive outcomes. Results confirmed the predictions at all levels considered: discipline, domain and methodology broadly defined. Controlling for observed differences between pure and applied disciplines, and between papers testing one or several hypotheses, the odds of reporting a positive result were around 5 times higher among papers in the disciplines of Psychology and Psychiatry and Economics and Business compared to Space Science, 2.3 times higher in the domain of social sciences compared to the physical sciences, and 3.4 times higher in studies applying behavioural and social methodologies on people compared to physical and chemical studies on non-biological material. In all comparisons, biological studies had intermediate values. These results suggest that the nature of hypotheses tested and the logical and methodological rigour employed to test them vary systematically across disciplines and fields, depending on the complexity of the subject matter and possibly other factors (e. g., a field's level of historical and/or intellectual development). On the other hand, these results support the scientific status of the social sciences against claims that they are completely subjective, by showing that, when they adopt a scientific approach to discovery, they differ from the natural sciences only by a matter of degree.