Observer > 2019 > November

Scientists from a range of disciplines are coming together to take a good look at themselves. APS Fellow Jonathan Schooler outlines how psychological science can enrich our understanding of the ways science — and scientists — work.

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Volume 32, Issue9November 2019
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Presidential Column

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Lisa Feldman Barrett
Northeastern University
APS President 2019 - 2020
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In this Issue:
Looking at Psychology Through the Lens of Metascience

About the Observer

Published 6 times per year by the Association for Psychological Science, the Observer educates and informs on matters affecting the research, academic, and applied disciplines of psychology; promotes the scientific values of APS members; reports on issues of international interest to the psychological science community; and provides a vehicle for the dissemination on information about APS.

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Up Front

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    Looking at Psychology Through the Lens of Metascience

    As psychological scientists, we think hard about the science we do. We formulate hypotheses and design studies. We observe our participants—the speed of button presses, fluctuations in blood pressure, the content of verbal reports—and we infer psychological meanings. I’d like to turn our focus to the process of science in general, which has been dubbed metascience. I mean, who can resist a little navel-gazing now and then? In early September 2019, I attended a conference that encouraged a multidisciplinary study of how scientists do science. This metascientific effort (one among many)[1] considered diverse factors that influence the questions we choose to ask, the experiments we decide to run, the priors we harbor when interpreting the data, and the conclusions we draw.

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