Nudge Emergency Pod: Harvard Fake Data Scandal
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Aug 7, 2023 A data-fraud scandal rocks behavioural science as researchers uncover suspicious entries in four studies by Harvard professor Francesca Gino. The discussion examines the disputed honesty-pledge and creativity experiments, what the allegations mean for marketers and the field, and whether one researcher’s case should shake confidence in behavioural science as a whole.
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Data Manipulation by Francesca Gino
- Francesca Gino, a Harvard professor, manipulated data in at least four studies altering outcomes significantly. - Her surprising and large effect size results raised suspicion and led to detailed investigations.
Honesty Pledge Study Setup
- Gino's 2012 study tested honesty pledges at the top versus the bottom of forms. - Participants shredded answer sheets but a rigged shredder preserved data, allowing cheating detection.
Suspicious Data Inflated Effect Size
- Suspicious duplicate participant IDs correlated with extreme honesty differences. - Removing these duplicates erased the dramatic effect, suggesting data tampering.