Academic Publications


Decline Effects

The tendency for the significance of scientific results to fade over time with repeated testing.

Alogna, V. K., Attaya, M. K., Aucoin, P., Bahník, Š., Birch, S., Birt, A. R., Bornstein, B. H., Bouwmeester, S., Brandimonte, M. A., Brown, C., Buswell, K., Carlson, C., Carlson, M., Chu, S., Cislak, A., Colarusso, M., Colloff, M. F., Dellapaolera, K. S., Delvenne, J.-F., … Zwaan, R. A. (2014). Registered replication report. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 9(5), 556–578. https://doi.org/10.1177/1745691614545653  

Bond, R., & Smith, P. B. (1996). Culture and conformity: A meta-analysis of studies using Asch’s (1952b, 1956) line judgment task. Psychological Bulletin119(1), 111.

Clements, J., Sundin, J., Clark, T. D., & Jutfelt, F. (2020). An extreme “decline effect” in ocean acidification effects on fish behaviour. https://doi.org/10.32942/osf.io/k9dby 

Clark, T. D., Raby, G. D., Roche, D. G., Binning, S. A., Speers-Roesch, B., Jutfelt, F., & Sundin, J. (2020). Ocean acidification does not impair the behaviour of coral reef fishes. Nature, 577(7790), 370–375. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-019-1903-y

Coyne, J. C., & de Voogd, J. N. (2012). Are we witnessing the decline effect in the Type D personality literature? What can be learned?. Journal of psychosomatic researcha, 73(6), 401-407.

Crystal‐Ornelas, R., & Lockwood, J. L. (2020). Cumulative meta‐analysis identifies declining but negative impacts of invasive species on richness after 20 yr. Ecology, 101(8). https://doi.org/10.1002/ecy.3082

de Bruin, A., & Della Sala, S. (2015). The decline effect: How initially strong results tend to decrease over time. Cortex, 73, 375–377. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cortex.2015.05.025

 De Bruin, A., & Della Sala, S. (2019). The bilingual advantage debate. The Handbook of the Neuroscience of Multilingualism, 736–753. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781119387725.ch35 

Delmas, H., Jouen, F., & Demarchi, S. (2020). The verifiability approach: A meta-analysis of published studies and a test of a decline effect. https://doi.org/10.31219/osf.io/y5zvx

Dixon-Woods, M., Leslie, M., Tarrant, C., & Bion, J. (2013). Explaining matching michigan: An ethnographic study of a patient safety program. Implementation Science, 8(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/1748-5908-8-70

Ezell, M. (2011). Are Social Workers Ignoring the “Cornerstone of Science” by Failing to Replicate Their Research? Social Work Research, 35(3), 131–134. http://www.jstor.org/stable/42659792

Fanelli, D., Costas, R., & Ioannidis, J. P. A. (2017). Meta-assessment of bias in science. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 114(14), 3714–3719. https://www.jstor.org/stable/26480687

Fernandez-Duque, E., & Valeggia, C. (1994). Meta-analysis: A valuable tool in conservation research. Conservation Biology, 8(2), 555–561. https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1523-1739.1994.08020555.x

Forwald, H. (1954). Chronological Decline Effects in a PK Placement Experiment. The Journal of Parapsychology, 18(1), 32.

Gehr, B. T., Weiss, C., & Porzsolt, F. (2006). The fading of reported effectiveness. A meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials. BMC Medical Research Methodology, 6(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2288-6-25

Gong, Z., & Jiao, X. (2019). Are effect sizes in emotional intelligence field declining? A meta-meta analysis. Frontiers in Psychology, 10. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.01655 

Gorman, D. M. (2017). The decline effect in evaluations of the impact of the strengthening families program for youth 10-14 (SFP 10-14) on adolescent substance use. Children and Youth Services Review, 81, 29–39. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.childyouth.2017.07.009

Grim, P. (1984). Psi phenomena and the Rosenthal effect. New Ideas in Psychology, 2(1), 35–45. https://doi.org/10.1016/0732-118x(84)90031-x

Groppe, D. M. (2015). Combating the scientific decline effect with confidence (intervals). https://doi.org/10.1101/034074

Haraldsson, E., & Houtkooper, J. M. (1995). Meta-analyses of 10 experiments on perceptual defensiveness and ESP: ESP scoring patterns and experimenter and decline effects. The Journal of Parapsychology, 59(3), 251.

Howard, M. O. (2011). Are Social Workers Ignoring the “Cornerstone of Science” by Failing to Replicate Their Research? A Rejoinder. Social Work Research, 35(3), 135-136. https://www.proquest.com/scholarly-journals/are-social-workers-ignoring-cornerstone-science/docview/922422516/se-2?accountid=14026  

Ioannidis, J. P. A., Ntzani, E. E., Trikalinos, T. A., & Contopoulos-Ioannidis, D. G. (2001). Replication validity of genetic association studies. Nature Genetics, 29(3), 306–309. https://doi.org/10.1038/ng749 

Ioannidis, J. P. (2005). Contradicted and initially stronger effects in highly cited clinical research. JAMA294(2), 218-228.

Ioannidis, J. P. (2006). Evolution and translation of research findings: From bench to where. PLoS Clinical Trials, 1(7). https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pctr.0010036  

Ioannidis, J. P. (2008). Why most discovered true associations are inflated. Epidemiology19(5), 640-648.

Ioannidis, J. P. A. (2012). Why Science Is Not Necessarily Self-Correcting. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 7(6), 645–654. http://www.jstor.org/stable/44282618

Jacobsen, S. D. (2017). An Interview with Professor Jonathan Schooler (Part Three). In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal, 14A,Part 10, 119–122.

Jennions, M. D., & Møller, A. P. (2002). Relationships fade with time: a meta-analysis of temporal trends in publication in ecology and evolution. Proceedings. Biological sciences269(1486), 43–48. https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2001.1832 

Jeschke, J., Gómez Aparicio, L., Haider, S., Heger, T., Lortie, C., Pyšek, P., & Strayer, D. (2012). Support for major hypotheses in invasion biology is uneven and declining. NeoBiota, 14, 1–20. https://doi.org/10.3897/neobiota.14.3435

Johnsen, T. J., & Friborg, O. (2015). The effects of cognitive behavioral therapy as an anti-depressive treatment is falling: A meta-analysis. Psychological Bulletin, 141(4), 747–768. https://doi.org/10.1037/bul0000015

Kennedy J. E. (2003). The capricious, actively evasive, unsustainable nature of psi: a summary and hypotheses. J. Parapsychol. 67, 53–74. Google Scholar

Koricheva, J., Jennions, M. & Lau, J. (2013). 15. Temporal Trends in Effect Sizes: Causes, Detection, and Implications. In J. Koricheva, J. Gurevitch & K. Mengersen (Ed.), Handbook of Meta-analysis in Ecology and Evolution (pp. 237-254). Princeton: Princeton University Press. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781400846184-017

Lauer, M. S. (2012). From hot hands to declining effects. Journal of the American College of Cardiology60(1), 72–74. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jacc.2012.02.048

Ledgerwood, A., & Sherman, J. W. (2012). Short, Sweet, and Problematic? The Rise of the Short Report in Psychological Science. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 7(1), 60–66. http://www.jstor.org/stable/41613543

Lee, M. S., Flammer, A. J., & Lerman, A. (2013). The decline effect in cardiovascular medicine: is the effect of cardiovascular medicine and stent on cardiovascular events decline over the years?. Korean Circulation Journal43(7), 443-452.

Lehrer, J. (2010). The truth wears off. The New Yorker, 13(52), 229.

Lehrer, J. (2010a, December 9). The mysterious decline effect. Wired. Retrieved from https://www.wired.com/2010/12/the-mysterious-decline-effect/

Makel, M. C., & Plucker, J. A. (2014). Facts Are More Important Than Novelty: Replication in the Education Sciences. Educational Researcher, 43(6), 304–316. http://www.jstor.org/stable/24571202

Merrill, E. (2014). EDITOR’S MESSAGE: Should We be Publishing More Null Results? The Journal of Wildlife Management, 78(4), 569–570. http://www.jstor.org/stable/43188181

Monsarrat, P., & Vergnes, J.-N. (2017). The intriguing evolution of effect sizes in biomedical research over time: Smaller but more often statistically significant. GigaScience, 7(1). https://doi.org/10.1093/gigascience/gix121

Mooneyham, B. W., Franklin, M. S., Mrazek, M. D., & Schooler, J. W. (2012). Modernizing Science: Comments on Nosek and Bar-Anan (2012). Psychological Inquiry, 23(3), 281–284. http://www.jstor.org/stable/43865578

Mueck, L. (2013). Report the awful truth! Nature Nanotechnology, 8(10), 693–695. https://doi.org/10.1038/nnano.2013.204  

Ozonoff, S. (2011). Editorial: The First Cut is the deepest: Why do the reported effects of treatments decline over trials? Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 52(7), 729–730. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-7610.2011.02425.x

Paap, K. R., Johnson, H. A., & Sawi, O. (2015). Bilingual advantages in executive functioning either do not exist or are restricted to very specific and undetermined circumstances. Cortex, 69, 265–278. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cortex.2015.04.014 

Palmer, A. R. (2002). Chimpanzee right‐handedness reconsidered: Evaluating the evidence with funnel plots. American Journal of Physical Anthropology,118(2), 191-199.

Palmer, A. R. (1999). Detecting publication bias in meta‐analyses: a case study of fluctuating asymmetry and sexual selection. The American Naturalist154(2), 220-233.

Palmer, A. R. (2000). Quasireplication and the contract of error: lessons from sex ratios, heritabilities and fluctuating asymmetry. Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics, 441-480.

Pietschnig, J., Siegel, M., Eder, J. S., & Gittler, G. (2019). Effect declines are systematic, strong, and ubiquitous: A meta-meta-analysis of the decline effect in Intelligence Research. Frontiers in Psychology, 10. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.02874

Protzko, J., & Schooler, J. W. (2017). Decline effects. Psychological Science Under Scrutiny, 85–107. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781119095910.ch6

Rabeyron, T. (2020). Why most research findings about PSI are false: The replicability crisis, the PSI paradox and the myth of Sisyphus. Frontiers in Psychology, 11. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.562992

Reeves, M. P., & Rhine, J. B. (1943). The PK Effect: II. A Study in Declines. The Journal of Parapsychology, 7(2), 76. https://www.proquest.com/scholarly-journals/pk-effect-ii-study-declines/docview/1292167151/se-2?accountid=14026

Rosenfield, D., Smits, J. A. J., Hofmann, S. G., Mataix-Cols, D., de la Cruz, L. F., Andersson, E., Rück, C., Monzani, B., Pérez-Vigil, A., Frumento, P., Davis, M., de Kleine, R. A., Difede, J. A., Dunlop, B. W., Farrell, L. J., Geller, D., Gerardi, M., Guastella, A. J., Hendriks, G.-J., … Otto, M. W. (2019). Changes in dosing and dose timing of d-cycloserine explain its apparent declining efficacy for augmenting exposure therapy for anxiety-related disorders: An individual participant-data meta-analysis. Journal of Anxiety Disorders, 68, 102149. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.janxdis.2019.102149

Sánchez-Tójar, A., Nakagawa, S., Sánchez-Fortún, M., Martin, D. A., Ramani, S., Girndt, A., Bókony, V., Kempenaers, B., Liker, A., Westneat, D. F., Burke, T., & Schroeder, J. (2018). Meta-analysis challenges a textbook example of status signalling and demonstrates publication bias. ELife, 7. https://doi.org/10.7554/elife.37385

Schooler, J. (2011). Unpublished results hide the decline effect. Nature,470(7335), 437.

Schooler, J. W. (2014). Turning the Lens of Science on Itself: Verbal Overshadowing, Replication, and Metascience. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 9(5), 579–583. http://www.jstor.org/stable/44290041

Shaw, A.D. (2017). Neurological disease models and their discontents: Validity, replicability, and the decline effect. Neural Dynamics of Neurological Disease, 153–173. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118634523.ch8

Thalbourne, M. A. (2009). Things That Go Bump, by Day and by Night: An Expectancy Effect? Australian Journal of Parapsychology, 9(1), 97–109. https://search.informit.org/doi/10.3316/informit.836949523533197

Trikalinos, T. A., Churchill, R., Ferri, M., Leucht, S., Tuunainen, A., Wahlbeck, K., & Ioannidis, J. P. (2004). Effect sizes in cumulative meta-analyses of mental health randomized trials evolved over time. Journal of clinical Epidemiology,57(11), 1124-1130.

Webster, G. D., & Duffy, R. D. (2016). Losing faith in the intelligence–religiosity link: New evidence for a decline effect, spatial dependence, and mediation by education and life quality. Intelligence, 55, 15-27.

Yeager, D. S., Krosnick, J. A., Visser, P. S., Holbrook, A. L., & Tahk, A. M. (2019). Moderation of classic social psychological effects by demographics in the U.S. adult population: New opportunities for theoretical advancement. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 117(6), e84–e99. https://doi.org/10.1037/pspa0000171