Research Integrity: Best Practices for the Social and Behavioral Sciences

"Scientific discoveries often build on - and are inspired by - previous discoveries. If the scientific enterprise were a tower of blocks, each piece representing a scientific finding, scientific progress might entail making the tower bigger and better block by block, discovery by discovery. Rather than strong wooden blocks, imagine the blocks, or scientific findings, can take on shape based on scientific accuracy. The most accurate pieces are the strongest and sturdiest, while the least accurate are soft and pliable. Building a tower of the scientific enterprise with a large number of inaccurate blocks will cause the tower to start to wobble, lean over, and potentially collapse, as more and more blocks are placed upon weak and faulty pieces"--