PUBLICATION DECISIONS REVISITED - THE EFFECT OF THE OUTCOME OF STATISTICAL TESTS ON THE DECISION TO PUBLISH AND VICE-VERSA

This article presents evidence that published results of scientific investigations are not a representative sample of results of all scientific studies. Research studies from II major journals demonstrate the existence of biases that favor studies that observe effects that, on statistical evaluation, have a low probability of erroneously rejecting the so-called null hypothesis (H-0). This practice makes the probability of erroneously rejecting H-0 different for the reader than for the investigator. It introduces two biases in the interpretation of the scientific literature: one due to multiple repetition of studies with false hypothesis, and one due to failure to publish smaller and less significant outcomes of tests of a true hypotheses. These practices distort the results of literature surveys and of mete-analyses. These results also indicate that practice leading to publication bias have not changed over a period of 30 years.