Evolving perspectives on open science

Psychologists have embraced efforts to make science more reproducible, transparent and accessible. However, psychology can continue to learn from other fields and sub-fields to broaden the open science movement.

Twenty years ago, a provocative article claimed that “most published research findings are false”¹. Ten years later, researchers that attempted to replicate a selection of 100 psychology studies found that fewer than half successfully replicated the original result². In the intervening decades, psychologists around the world have engaged in efforts to improve reproducibility, transparency and access to research. These efforts are widespread and well-known, and include initiatives such as preregistration and registered reports; preprint servers; data and code sharing; and alternatives to null-hypothesis statistical testing. These and other practices to promote open science have become embedded in journal and society policies, laboratory research protocols and graduate student training.

However, these standard practices are not one-size-fits-all and do not incorporate all perspectives — and, therefore, do not reflect the diversity of psychological science. Since Nature Reviews Psychology launched in 2022, we have published three pieces that suggest how open science can learn from other fields. Each highlights how researchers can incorporate perspectives that were previously undervalued or overlooked in the open science movement.

In a Comment in this issue, Madeleine Pownall argues that common open science standards from quantitative psychology should not be assumed to be appropriate for qualitative research or taken as a universal measure of quality and rigour. For instance, pre-registration is inappropriate for some survey studies, and studies of lived experience do not aim for generalizability. However, rather than abandoning open science efforts for qualitative research, Pownall suggests enriching open science efforts across psychology by applying principles from qualitative research. For example, incorporating reflexivity and participatory knowledge production into open science can produce a research culture that is flexible, collaborative and equitable.

In another Comment article, P. Priscilla Lui notes that conducting open science requires certain financial and social resources. Consequently, open science can be more difficult for research that is marginalized, such as diversity science and research on the lived experiences of minority ethnic and racial groups³. Diversity science and other multicultural research perspectives have similar goals to the open science movement: to produce research that is transparent and accountable to the public. Lui argues that by using tools from multicultural research and open science in tandem, psychological scientists can simultaneously address reproducibility and generalizability issues. Like Pownall, she suggests reducing the barriers to open science participation and broadening the perspectives that underlie these efforts.

A third call for how to broaden open science comes from Laura Silva, who notes the relevance of feminist philosophy to the study of psychology in another Comment article⁴. Philosophers have a strong grounding in conceptual analysis and argumentation methods, which can enrich psychological frameworks, foster interdisciplinary collaborations and be used to scrutinize underlying assumptions. Feminist philosophy in particular brings the concepts of intersectionality and reflexivity, which can enrich psychological research by improving standards for rigour and validity. As with the goals of qualitative research and multiculturalism, these goals align with those of the open science movement.

“Embracing principles from qualitative research, multiculturalism and philosophy can spur an evolution of open science fit for the decades to come”

The past two decades have shown that psychology researchers are keen to embrace practices to make research more transparent, accessible and reliable. However, these efforts are not without barriers, and incorporating diverse perspectives and influences from across the social sciences will be key to their success. Embracing principles from qualitative research, multiculturalism and philosophy can spur an evolution of open science fit for the decades to come.