Fall 2011 - Institute of Medical Science - University of Toronto

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VIEWPOINT POSITIVE PRESSURE The research bias towards positive results Science involves the discovery of new results, both positive and negative. Negative results can be just as important as positive results, as the dissemination of negative results can prevent other scientists from needlessly repeating the same experiment, therefore saving time and resources. However, negative results are often taboo in individual labs and in peer-reviewed publications in major journals. Why does this bias exist, and what can be done about it? By Allison Rosen The scientific process involves studying the world through observation and experimentation in order to attain knowledge (the word science comes from the Latin word scientia, meaning knowledge). Hypotheses are formed and experiments are conducted to assess the validity of these hypotheses. This is a self-correcting cycle and it is designed to hone in on increasingly precise and accurate theories. At the onset of a study, a hypothesis is created, and a corresponding null hypothesis is also formed. While a hypothesis asserts a relationship between two variables, the null hypothesis is a default position; for example, the null hypothesis states that there is no relationship between the two variables under study. A key concept in science is that experimental results are interpreted relative to the null hypothesis. At their most basic, positive results reject the null hypothesis, while negative results fail to reject it. It is important to note that rejecting the null hypothesis means that there is a high degree of probability it is incorrect and that the alternative hypothesis may be true – this is never absolute. Thus, a hypothesis can never be fully proven; evidence either supports or falsifies it. Despite the lucid nature of the scientific method, the idea of science as a pure practice striving towards truth is flawed. There are a number of scientific biases, despite many countermeasures put in place to combat them. Scientists at every level encounter a multitude of problems – for example, funding issues, equipment problems, and pressures – that often occlude their ability to treat all results as equally important. In particular, publication bias is the tendency to publish positive results more than negative results. Since this leads to an overrepresentation of positive data, it can also lead to an overall bias in published literature; therefore, addressing Photo courtesy of http://www.sxc.hu/photo/1275249 33 | IMS MAGAZINE FALL 2011 PROSTATE CANCER
VIEWPOINT this bias should be of high importance to the scientific community. Negative results from lab to publication In medical research, discovering that a drug is efficacious, for example, or that a lifestyle factor influences health, is clearly important. But is it any less important to discover that a drug does not work, or that a lifestyle factor has no effect on a health outcome? Much of academia is focused on the ethos of “publish or perish,” yet the world of publishing is built around positive, rather than negative, results. A recent correspondence in Nature further expounds the issue by illustrating how repressing negative results can skew the literature. National Institutes of Health researcher Nitin Gupta (2011) writes that it is important to publish negative results because, when combined with significant results from other studies in meta-analyses or reviews, less robust results may be discovered. Inclusion of negative results in these compilations can aid in more accurate comparisons and corrections across studies. Gupta explains his opinions using a hypothetical experiment that failed to reach the P
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Fall 2011 - Institute of Medical Science - University of Toronto

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