Although large research collaborations have been popular among most schools of science, few have ever been done in psychology. Therefore, very few experiments have been checked, or double-checked by many different research groups. This is up until recently when “several collaborations that span dozens of psychology laboratories around the world” began to form.

            These collaborations have begun testing past experiments, and checking to see if the results can be replicated. Of the first thirteen experiments, ten results were replicated. The psychological community is pretty happy about the findings. They’re happy to know that what they study, and what they have tested is actually legitimate, and not just human error.

            However, these results still make me wary. Three out of thirteen results may seem like a small number, but that’s close to a quarter of the studies. While I doubt that the percentage of the population of studies that are not replicated will be that high, I’m still not so sure of what to think. Things that we think we know about psychology could end up being completely untrue, and no small number of them either. Even ten percent of the studies being proven false would be huge to me. Who knows what else these groups of researchers will prove to be untrue.