Why publishing everything is more effective than selective publishing of statistically significant results.
BACKGROUND
De Winter and Happee examined whether science based on selective publishing of significant results may be effective in accurate estimation of population effects, and whether this is even more effective than a science in which all results are published (i.e., a science without publication bias). Based on their simulation study they concluded that "selective publishing yields a more accurate meta-analytic estimation of the true effect than publishing everything, (and that) publishing nonreplicable results while placing null results in the file drawer can be beneficial for the scientific collective" (p.4).


RESULTS
Using their scenario with a small to medium population effect size, we show that publishing everything is more effective for the scientific collective than selective publishing of significant results. Additionally, we examined a scenario with a null effect, which provides a more dramatic illustration of the superiority of publishing everything over selective publishing.


CONCLUSIONS
Publishing everything is more effective than only reporting significant outcomes.
Department of Methodology and Statistics, Tilburg School of Behavioral Sciences, Tilburg University, Tilburg, The Netherlands.
Marcel A L M
MA
van Assen
Department of Methodology and Statistics, Tilburg School of Behavioral Sciences, Tilburg University, Tilburg, The Netherlands.
Robbie C M
RC
van Aert
Department of Methodology and Statistics, Tilburg School of Behavioral Sciences, Tilburg University, Tilburg, The Netherlands.
Michèle B
MB
Nuijten
Department of Methodology and Statistics, Tilburg School of Behavioral Sciences, Tilburg University, Tilburg, The Netherlands.
Jelte M
JM
Wicherts
D015201:Meta-Analysis as Topic; D011642:Publications / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D011643:Publishing / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D013223:Statistics as Topic