A New Type of Research Paper Proposed: “No Publication Without Confirmation”

From Nature:

Jeffrey S. Mogil (McGill University) and Malcolm R. Macleod propose a new kind of paper that combines the flexibility of basic research with the rigour of clinical trials.
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What we propose here is a compromise between the need to trust conclusions in published papers and the freedom for basic scientists to explore and innovate1. Our proposal is a new type of paper for animal studies of disease therapies or preventions: one that incorporates an independent, statistically rigorous confirmation of a researcher’s central hypothesis. We call this large confirmatory study a preclinical trial. These would be more formal and rigorous than the typical preclinical testing conducted in academic labs, and would adopt many practices of a clinical trial.
We believe that this requirement would push researchers to be more sceptical of their own work. Instead of striving to convince reviewers and editors to publish a paper in prestigious outlets, they would be questioning whether their hypotheses could stand up in a large, confirmatory animal studies.

Source: Nature
Volume 542; Issue 7642
doi:10.1038/542409a
Read the Complete Article (approx. 2060 words), Listen to Interview with Co-Author) ||| PDF Version of Article

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