Author Archives: Cedar Riener
Social Media as a Catalyst for Psychological Science
Can social media serve as a catalyst for psychological science? I think many scientists are rightly skeptical of social media as a replacement for other normal scientific processes. Peer review will not be replaced by Tweep Review. Methods sections will not be … Continue reading
Social Media as a Catalyst for Psychological Science – My presentation
At the recent Association for Psychological Science annual convention, I co-chaired a symposium on “Social Media as a Catalyst for Psychologist Science.” In my next post I will give some context to the entire session, but first, here is my … Continue reading
Posted in psychology, science
Tagged APS14sf, psychological science, psychology, social media, twitter
5 Comments
On Controversial College Speakers, Debating and Critical Thinking
Azusa Pacific University recently disinvited Charles Murray from giving a talk there. The talk had been scheduled for months, but apparently no one realized the full extent of his bad reputation. He wrote an open letter in response. Although regular readers … Continue reading
Posted in science
2 Comments
Thumb on the PayScale
In my last post, I took issue with the PayScale college rankings, as well as with how economics reporters framed these rankings, citing their low calculated Return on Investment as evidence that these colleges “make” students poor. Jordan Weissmann has graciously responded to my critique. … Continue reading
Posted in education, higherEd, psychology, science
Tagged college, college rankings, highered, PayScale
20 Comments
The Absurdity of Ranking Colleges by Graduate Salaries
Jordan Weissman has moved from the Atlantic, and is now covering economics at Slate. He has a post up provocatively titled (it is Slate, after all) “What College Will Leave you Poorest?” which covers the Payscale college salary rankings, in which … Continue reading
Grit and Galton: Is psychological research into traits inherently problematic?
Is all psychological research on individual differences racist? Can psychologists ever separate our shameful past of scientific racism from the methods, techniques and questions that have grown from it? A recent post criticizing the concept of “grit” (and Angela Duckworth, … Continue reading
Posted in education, psychology, research, science
Tagged Angela Duckworth, Duckworth, Francis Galton, grit, psychology
7 Comments
On Treating the Unprepared as if they were Unmotivated and Unworthy
An academic job market story yesterday reminded me of the perils of interpreting lack of preparation with lack of worth. A philosophy candidate for a job at Nazareth College in Rochester was offered the job, made some fairly common requests, … Continue reading
How much does it matter how students feel?
As I prepare my tenure portfolio, I am catching up on entering in my student evaluation data and comments into my big spreadsheet. While I don’t think student evaluations should serve as the only data by which to judge teachers, … Continue reading
Posted in education, higherEd, psychology
Tagged learning styles, psychology, student evaluations, teaching
7 Comments
Oh I get tenure, with a little help from my friends
To continue from my last post, one of the elements that disturbed me about defining scientist as “gets grants, has groundbreaking ideas” is not just that this narrow definition of scientist excludes worthy people, but also that it excludes certain … Continue reading
Tents, Tribes and Lonely Islands: Who Gets to Be a Scientist?
A recent post by thoughtful, charismatic, and talented friend Scicurious on how the “system” of science training failed her, but should have failed her sooner has gotten me thinking a lot about my role in the science “system.” Sci’s argument … Continue reading
