tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7890764972166411105.post4329548582987602423..comments2024-03-29T06:02:41.835+01:00Comments on Nick Brown's blog: Dream on: Playing pinball in your sleep does not make you a better personNick Brownhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00172030184497186082noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7890764972166411105.post-4894024798120801642015-06-05T17:08:48.943+02:002015-06-05T17:08:48.943+02:00The irony is that it takes four times the number o...The irony is that it takes four times the number of studies to get in a journal with 1/4 the impact factor (JPSP).Roger G-Shttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08594440701279968693noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7890764972166411105.post-3872352286972817002015-06-05T12:25:02.382+02:002015-06-05T12:25:02.382+02:00It seems to me that a lot of the studies cited in ...It seems to me that a lot of the studies cited in that review article (which I admit I hadn't read until now) are rats, or refer to *conscious* memories (I don't think that there's any suggestion that people forget that they don't want to be sexist/racist), or use odour instead of sound as cues, etc.<br /><br />But I'm happy to agree with you that the main problem is that the sample size is way too small. The problem is that Science accepted it, which as far as the media is concerned, means that is now The Official Truth As Validated By One Of The World's Most Prestigious Journals. These findings will be added to the pile of Stuff People Put In Business Books and which orbit the periphery of academia for ever, occasionally bumping into a china teapot.Nick Brownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18266307287741345798noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7890764972166411105.post-15927950150815390622015-06-05T12:05:11.592+02:002015-06-05T12:05:11.592+02:00I am not a statistic expert either, but it does se...I am not a statistic expert either, but it does seem a bit sketchy. Specifically: the low sample, the dramatically low number of participants per condition, the high exclusion rate and more.<br /><br />Why did they use SEM bars in their graphs? They are very 'convenient' for small samples as they tend to be very small, is that the reason? A SD-bar or 95%CI bar would be more informative. Furthermore, if I remember correctly you cannot deduce anything from SEM bars which are not overlapping. If SEM bars overlap the difference cannot be significant, but if they don't the difference may or may not be significant.<br /><br />Other than the low amount of participants, the whole experiment seems to falter on the high initial difference in IAT scores. Like you said, this has serious implications as the entire study might be explainable by regression to the mean.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7890764972166411105.post-7908502411140421662015-06-05T10:39:06.164+02:002015-06-05T10:39:06.164+02:00"The authors claimed that "Past research..."The authors claimed that "Past research indicates" that this process leads to reinforcement of learning (although the only reference they provided is an article from the same lab with the same corresponding author)."<br /><br />This is not true. They cite this review article and in there are several studies demonstrating how this memory reactivation by auditory and olfactory cues work.<br /><br />http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S136466131300020X<br />and e.g., http://www.sciencemag.org/content/326/5956/1079.short<br /><br /><br />Apart from that I think the main problem with the study is that the sample size is way too small to draw any strong conclusions.<br />Most of the other remarks are probably due to the very hard space restrictions in Science and would not be that bad if it weren't for the small sample size. <br />I still think it is an interesting study, but has to be treated with caution. Let's see if it replicates.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com