Replication and replicability

The process of independently repeating earlier studies—by interrogating the same research questions, and employing the same or similar methods and data—is broadly considered the cornerstone of science, and key to advancing academic knowledge and maintaining trust in scholarly research. The issue of poor reproducibility and the associated ‘replication crisis’, particularly in the biomedical, natural sciences and behavioural sciences, are well documented in the literature. Despite this, there remain divergent opinions on the definition and meaning of key terms (such as replication, reproducibility and transparency), as well on the feasibility of replicating research in some fields, notably in the humanities.

This collection sets out to consider ‘replication’ and ‘replicability’ (and related concepts) specifically in the context of the social sciences and humanities, disciplines whose research cultures and practices often differ considerably to those in STEM.

We welcome research on a range of themes, including but not restricted, to:

• New perspectives on the ‘replication crisis’
• Terminology and definitions (e.g., of widely used terms such as replication, reproducibility, etc)
• Causes of and obstacles to replication, such as disciplinary challenges (e.g. in empirical areas of scholarship)
• Case studies of successful/unsuccessful replication
• Examples of best practice
• Strategies to improve research transparency and reproducibility (e.g. role of registered reporting)
• Contributions of different stakeholders (e.g. funders, publishers)
• Replication and replicability within the context of debate on open research and research integrity
• Emerging methods to enable replications
• Cross-disciplinary dialogue (e.g., challenges of divergences in terminology and research cultures)
• Value of negative results and failures to replicate
• Reactions to the ‘replication crisis’ (e.g., structural and community-driven changes)