This month, Britannica released a response (PDF) to an article that appeared in the Dec. 15, 2005 issue of Nature. The one disturbing issue in this response from Britannica (agree, disagree, I don’t care) is that Nature refuses to provide Britannica with the raw data from the experiment.

The minute an organization or author is unwilling to provide raw data for an experiment is the minute red flags are raised about the validity and reliability of that data. Researchers who falsify data or fraudulently alter data to fit their needs tend to also not want to provide access to the raw data. So the question remains, Why won’t Nature provide Britannica the raw data it is asking for?

Also disturbing, of course, are the findings of the folks over at Britannica. The short summary is that Wikipedia had 30% more inaccuracies than Britannica, and they argue that number is much larger because of the manner in which the Nature researchers conducted their study (drawing upon a multitude of Britannica resources, for instance, not just the Britannica encyclopedia).

It appears that the researchers at Nature had a hypothesis that they already had the answer for. They just wanted data to back them up, and manipulated what data they were comparing (and putting a fair amount of subjectivity into the process just for good measure), to ensure they got back results that confirmed their hypothesis.

Not a good day for research.

Dr. John Grohol is the CEO and founder of Psych Central. He is an author, researcher and expert in mental health online, and has been writing about online behavior, mental health and psychology issues -- as well as the intersection of technology and human behavior -- since 1992. Dr. Grohol sits on the editorial board of the journal Cyberpsychology, Behavior and Social Networking and is a founding board member and treasurer of the Society for Participatory Medicine.

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    Last reviewed: By John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on 23 Mar 2006
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