It irritates me to no end that the original study is so much better known than the utter failure to replicate. I have to suspect that this has something to do with how conveniently it fits many programmers’ notion that programmers are a special sort of person, possessed of some power beyond merely a lot of practice at programming and related skills.
I feel much the same way about dual n-back studies. There was an article this month or last about WM training with Jaeggi and Buschkuel as authors… and it mentioned not a single issue. Gah!
I think that interesting results which fail to replicate are almost always better-known than the failure to replicate. I think it’s a fundamental problem of science, rather than a special weakness of programmers.
It irritates me to no end that the original study is so much better known than the utter failure to replicate. I have to suspect that this has something to do with how conveniently it fits many programmers’ notion that programmers are a special sort of person, possessed of some power beyond merely a lot of practice at programming and related skills.
I feel much the same way about dual n-back studies. There was an article this month or last about WM training with Jaeggi and Buschkuel as authors… and it mentioned not a single issue. Gah!
The more recent meta-analysis appears to support their initial conclusion.
I think that interesting results which fail to replicate are almost always better-known than the failure to replicate. I think it’s a fundamental problem of science, rather than a special weakness of programmers.