File Drawer Effect
The file drawer effect, or file drawer problem, is that many studies in a given area of research may be conducted but never reported, and those that are not reported may on average report different results from those that are reported. An extreme scenario is that a given null hypothesis of interest is in fact true, i.e. the association being studied does not exist, but the 5% of studies that by chance show a statistically significant result are published, while the remaining 95% where the null hypothesis was not rejected languish in researchers' file drawers. Even a small number of studies lost "in the file drawer" can result in a significant bias. The term "file drawer problem" was coined by the psychologist Robert Rosenthal in 1979.
Read more about this topic: Publication Bias
Famous quotes containing the words file drawer, file, drawer and/or effect:
“I have been a soreheaded occupant of a file drawer labeled “Science Fiction” ... and I would like out, particularly since so many serious critics regularly mistake the drawer for a urinal.”
—Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. (b. 1922)
“While waiting to get married, several forms of employment were acceptable. Teaching kindergarten was for those girls who stayed in school four years. The rest were secretaries, typists, file clerks, or receptionists in insurance firms or banks, preferably those owned or run by the family, but respectable enough if the boss was an upstanding Christian member of the community.”
—Barbara Howar (b. 1934)
“I have imbibed such a love for money that I keep some sequins in a drawer to count, & cry over them once a week.”
—George Gordon Noel Byron (1788–1824)
“Other countries drink to get drunk, and this is accepted by everyone; in France, drunkenness is a consequence, never an intention. A drink is felt as the spinning out of a pleasure, not as the necessary cause of an effect which is sought: wine is not only a philtre, it is also the leisurely act of drinking.”
—Roland Barthes (1915–1980)