Meta-Research Center at Tilburg University
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| Established | 2012 |
|---|---|
Parent institution | Tilburg University |
| Location | , Netherlands |
| Website | metaresearch |
The Meta-Research Center at Tilburg University is a metascience research center within the School of Social and Behavioral Sciences at the Dutch Tilburg University. They were profiled in a September 2018 article in Science.[1]
Meta-research aims to improve reproducibility by studying how science is practiced and published and developing better ways for the scientific community to operate.
The research institute has published a large statistical meta-analysis of studies on the effect of Stereotype threat on girls' mathematics performance. They also use methods for estimating publication bias.[2]
The research institute has developed an R based software tool called Statcheck that can detect incorrect statistical methods used in research articles. A large amount of statistical errors were detected in a sample of 50 000 psychology research articles.[3] The use of it was perceived negatively by some of the researchers.[4][5][6] The data mining practices of the research center have been in conflict with the policies of scientific publisher Elsevier.[7]
A scientific misconduct case in the field of social psychology at Tilburg University has been a contributing factor in establishing the research center.[4]
Advocacy
The research center makes recommendations for other researchers about how to avoid publication bias and to improve the statistical strength of results. They have stated support for pre-registration of studies and open sharing of research data.[5]