Unpublished results hide the decline effect

摘要

Many scientifically discovered effects published in the literature seem to diminish with time. Dubbed the decline effect, this puzzling anomaly was first discovered in the 1930s in research into parapsychology, in which the statistical significance of purported evidence for psychic ability declined as studies were repeated. It has since been reported in a string of fields - both in individual labs (including my own) and in meta-analyses of findings in biology and medicine. The issue has been recognized in some circles within the scientific community, but rose to wider prominence last December when it was discussed in an article in the magazine The New Yorker.