Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

simine vazire @simine.com · 17h

Thank you @hildabast.bsky.social for the help moving it to Wordpress!

simine vazire @simine.com · 17h

My blog has moved! It’s now at sometimesimwrongblog.wordpress.com If you have links to posts in your syllabus, let me know if you have any trouble finding the corresponding post!

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simine vazire @simine.com · 18d

Very lucky to have @jamiecummins.bsky.social as a STAR editor at Psych Science, helping us navigate these kinds of issues. This is such important work.

Jamie Cummins @jamiecummins.bsky.social · 20d

Can large language models stand in for human participants?
Many social scientists seem to think so, and are already using "silicon samples" in research.

One problem: depending on the analytic decisions made, you can basically get these samples to show any effect you want.

THREAD 🧵

The threat of analytic flexibility in using large language models to simulate human data: A call to attention

Social scientists are now using large language models to create "silicon samples" - synthetic datasets intended to stand in for human respondents, aimed at revolutionising human subjects research. How...

arxiv.org

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simine vazire @simine.com · 18d

Another chapter in the book of “Sometimes There’s Nothing There & Using Fancy Stats to Find Something Can Be a Bad Idea”

Do you wish we could understand causality by finding lagged effects in longitudinal data?
Bad news - lagged effects are probably rare, & even the RI-CLPM is an ill-suited test.

Rich Lucas @richlucas.bsky.social · 19d

Interested in models used to estimate lagged effects in panel data? We (@rebiweidmann.bsky.social, Hyewon Yang) have a new paper looking at patterns of stability and their implications for bias and model choice: osf.io/preprints/ps... [1/x]

OSF

osf.io

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Annie Whamond @anniewham.bsky.social · 20d

Excited to finally have my first paper officially published! "How Do Psychology Journals Handle Postpublication Critique?" is now online with AMPPS. Huge thanks to my supervisors @tomhardwicke.bsky.social and @simine.com and co-authors @bethclarke.bsky.social, N Moodie, S Schiavone, and R Thibault ☺️

Sage Journals: Discover world-class research

Subscription and open access journals from Sage, the world's leading independent academic publisher.

doi.org

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Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences @psychunimelb.bsky.social · 21d

We speak to @simine.com, @wchiggins.bsky.social and Laura Conlon about MetaMelb. This lab studies what is essentially ‘the psychology of psychology research’ – examining practices and norms across psychology.

Read it here: go.unimelb.edu.au/753p

The psychology of psychology: Inside MetaMelb

psychologicalsciences.unimelb.edu.au

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Franki Kung @frankikung.bsky.social · 28d

FYI - New @spspnews.bsky.social session on Navigating Uncertainty: A Community Conversation on Research Funding Challenges

Friday, September 19
2 - 3 PM ET (free and virtual)

Sign up: community.spsp.org/events/sNhWo...

SPSP

nam04.safelinks.protection.outlook.com

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simine vazire @simine.com · Sep 4

If I’m understanding right, Aaron Clauset at Peer Review Congress showing that the strongest correlate of peer review outcomes at Science and Science Advances is the prestige of authors’ institutions. Also pretty big association with author geography, not much with author gender. #PRC10

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simine vazire @simine.com · Sep 4

At the Peer Review Congress #PRC10, @maclomaclee.bsky.social talks about flaws in meta-research. Often only points out problems, doesn’t test solutions, & often uses suboptimal methods (observational design, convenience samples).
Great points, but imo, pointing out problems can be big contribution.

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Annie Whamond @anniewham.bsky.social · Sep 4

How do the discussion sections of paper mill articles in cancer research differ from similar literature? Drop by my poster to hear me over explain this graph in person today and tomorrow ✨ @peerreviewcongress.bsky.social #PRC10

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Olmo van den Akker @denolmo.bsky.social · Sep 4

A meta-perspective by Malcolm Macleod on the presentations at #PRC10.

Are we going for low hanging fruit too much in research on peer review / publication?

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Society for the Improvement of Psychological Science (SIPS) @improvingpsych.org · Aug 30

PsyArXiv is now down to only ~40% of the backlog we started with, thanks to our amazing moderators 🎉 To all mods: thank you so much for your hard work!

Did one of your preprints get approved recently? Help us show our thanks by liking and sharing this post :)

#PsyArXiv #PsychSciSky

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Alex Holcombe @alexh.bsky.social · Aug 29

Michael was my undergraduate thesis advisor. I have been moved to write some reflections on his life, and my time with him open.substack.com/pub/alexholc... #visionScience A hashtag seems gauche, but Michael should be more widely known - he didn't attend conferences much.

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simine vazire @simine.com · Aug 27

Yikes. My blog is on Typepad. I have one month to rescue it. Any tips on what I should do? I’d like to keep it active (not just back it up, but host it somewhere else in case I ever get around to writing more posts). I’d love recommendations, esp ones that require little/no technical skills 😂

Andy Baio @andy.baio.net · Aug 27

After 22 years, Typepad is shutting down with one month's notice. Go back up your old blogs, old-school blogger friends. everything.typepad.com/blog/2025/08...

Typepad is shutting down

We have made the difficult decision to discontinue Typepad, effective September 30, 2025. What Does This Mean for You? After September 30, 2025, access to Typepad – including account management, blogs...

everything.typepad.com

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simine vazire @simine.com · Aug 27

A letter to the editor from @alexh.bsky.social et al. about an error in a published paper led to retraction. Great to see the record corrected, but also raises tricky issues about what the right form of correction is, how to credit the error detectors, and how to reduce future chances of same error.

Alex Holcombe @alexh.bsky.social · Aug 22

“This simple experiment gives objective evidence for Stroud’s perceptual moment theory.” It does no such thing, and now, the article has been RETRACTED.

We called for its retraction in a letter we wrote to the Attention Perception & Psychophysics editor in 2023, and now posted on PubPeer.

RETRACTED ARTICLE: Insights into the perceptual moment theory: Experimental evidence from simultaneity judgment - Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics

The perception appears to flow in a continuous pattern but evidence suggest that perception may involve discrete temporal sampling of peripheral cues. Stroud’s perceptual moment theory proposes that p...

link.springer.com

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Society for the Improvement of Psychological Science (SIPS) @improvingpsych.org · Aug 22

We are in awe of our community's response -- over 300 people have volunteered to moderate PsyArXiv! We’ve already cleared 13% of the backlog and expect to make even faster progress next week. Thank you for your patience as we work through this, and special thanks to our volunteers! 🎉 #PsychSciSky

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Society for the Improvement of Psychological Science (SIPS) @improvingpsych.org · Aug 21

Want to help moderate preprints on PsyArXiv? We're hosting a training tomorrow morning. Register here: us06web.zoom.us/j/8114764450... More trainings are coming as well! Already registered using the other form? Check your spam folder -- some of our email invitations are going to spam. #PsychSciSky

Welcome! You are invited to join a meeting: PsyArXiv Moderator Training #2. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the meeting.

us06web.zoom.us

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simine vazire @simine.com · Aug 20

Looking forward to listening to this episode of the @psychunimelb.bsky.social podcast, with Luke Smillie!

Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences @psychunimelb.bsky.social · Aug 19

Why do some people seem naturally kind? Prof Luke Smillie breaks down personality traits like empathy, honesty and compassion – and how they shape behaviour. 🎧Find it here go.unimelb.edu.au/7axe

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simine vazire @simine.com · Aug 19

Amazing! More good news!

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simine vazire @simine.com · Aug 18

I know it’s gauche to share good news on here, but our university’s IRB (ethics office) just declared that low risk applications will no longer be reviewed by 4 people & then go to a committee. They’ll be reviewed by 1 person.
I almost can’t believe a change this positive is possible in this world.

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simine vazire @simine.com · Aug 17

We stopped at the giant ram on our roadtrip and Hugo insisted we take a picture.

Simine and Hugo (the dog) in front a giant ram statue. Hugo looks like he doesn’t want to be there.

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Samuel Moore @samuelmoore.org · Aug 14

Excellent news!

"PLOS Biology will formally consider meta-research articles that are peer-reviewed on the MetaROR platform, collaborating with RoRI and AIMOS to improve the transparency of peer review in the field of meta-research."

theplosblog.plos.org/2025/08/plos...

PLOS Biology announces agreement to become a MetaROR partner journal - The Official PLOS Blog

Note: PLOS issued the following press release on Thursday, August 14th. SAN FRANCISCO, CA — Today, PLOS Biology announced a new agreement…

theplosblog.plos.org

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Katie Corker @katiecorker.bsky.social · Aug 14

"Preregistration" lumps three distinct practices into one:

- Study registration
- Protocol
- Analysis plans (SAPs)

To advance open science, it's critical that we distinguish them.

🌟 🌟 Now in-press paper from Evan Mayo-Wilson, @seangrant.bsky.social, David Moher, me: osf.io/preprints/me...

OSF

osf.io

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simine vazire @simine.com · Aug 11

In exchange I educated Rafe about PsychMAP vs PsychMAD facebook groups circa 2015, a classic in the modern history of social psychology. (It was a long road trip)

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Wendy Higgins @wchiggins.bsky.social · Aug 6

oh wow! lovely to see people engaging with my research 😃

www.bps.org.uk/research-dig...

The ‘Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test’ may be less robust than we thought | BPS

A new paper assesses the widely-used tool.

www.bps.org.uk

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