Conference Overview
The 2015 conference took place on June 18 and 19. It provided an opportunity for attendees to present research, share ideas, and engage in discussion concerning the causes of and potential solutions to violations of scientific integrity.
The main purposes of this event were:
- To identify a full range of problematic behaviors in the conduct of science
- Propose empirically testable hypotheses about their potential causes and consequences and amelioration strategies
- Propose study designs for testing those hypotheses rigorously.
Rather than conduct a conference where presentations took up most of the time and interaction with the audience was limited, this conference was highly collaborative and interactive. Each speaker gave a short presentation (e.g., 10 minutes) that was followed by a long discussion during which attendees brainstorm ideas about the speaker’s topic.
We are writing a report that will summarize the insights from the discussions at the conference and provide recommendations to combat suboptimal behavior in the sciences. This volume will focus on three questions: (1) What behaviors and structural processes constitute the most common threats to scientific efficiency? (2) How can the causes of these problematic behaviors and processes be empirically identified? (3) How can the effectiveness of proposed solutions/interventions be empirically tested?