My only rule is to scribble down a question, however broad or bland, for each panellist. Then if one of them isn’t getting any questions, you can throw one in to get them going.
Alex Crenshaw
@crenshaw.bsky.social
Assistant Professor of Psychology. Couples, clinical trials, stats & methods. Views my own.
I feel ambivalent whether preregistration should be standard for any experiment. But when interpreting clinical trial results, knowing a bit about the history, I treat studies pub’d before the era of mandatory trial registration with extreme skepticism. Hard to defend the 1st thought given the 2nd
Half the planet is having a massive fight about how to correctly interpret an Ancient Greek poem but go ahead, close some more humanities departments.
A reminder if you need a printer and are frustrated with the options because they suck. Just buy this Brother printer. It's fine www.theverge.com/23642073/bes...
Best printer 2023: just buy this Brother laser printer everyone has, it’s fine
Do you really want to think any more about printers than this?
theverge.com
The version in the couples literature is “we threw all these variables in a model together to see what is most important” and it’s a rampaging epidemic
Colleen Reynolds@colleenareynolds.bsky.social · 2w agoThere is a major problem with how applied health (equity) researchers think about covariate control. I often read research papers where the paper is trying to answer an important question....But the adjustment set doesn't make sense. #episky 1/3
In Nepal, HIV outreach workers left jobless by U.S. foreign aid cuts turn to sex work to survive, walking the streets alongside the very people they once fought so hard to help.
Sex work or starve: Aid workers in Nepal left jobless by USAID cuts turn to sex work to survive
After the United States slashed its foreign aid funding last year, more than 280,000 aid workers worldwide lost their jobs.
bit.ly
Sensing your body (‘Interoception’) is everywhere in theories of mental health. But when we tested how well hundreds of people sensed their heart and lungs, the link to symptoms was almost nowhere to be found. 💣 🚨New @natmentalhealth.nature.com paper 🚨🎉 asks why 🧵 www.nature.com/articles/s44...
Our view is that studying interoception at rest may be missing the point entirely. Forthcoming work with @fiorelladpc.bsky.social calls it the "Quiescence Trap", like judging a car's aerodynamics while parked. We need to study bodily sensing during real physiological stress and symptom onset
The spider bite leading one to become a methodologist: "[substantive topic] is a interesting, I want to study it!" [Learns about how topic is typically studied] "Oh my god" [Becomes a methodologist]
Peter Tennant@pwgtennant.bsky.social · 3w agoI cannot believe how many of these RCTs used a change/percent change outcomes. Because the literature is so clear on the topic I honestly thought this issue was resolved! @f2harrell.bsky.social @stephensenn.bsky.social
The editorial process for this paper was the best I've ever exp'd. Sharp feedback that hugely improved the argument & led to the 8 properties. Raising ~12 new refs to consider, leading to a rabbit hole of me reading ~30 more papers. & those papers inspired an idea for the next paper I want to write
Alex Crenshaw@crenshaw.bsky.social · 4w agoNew commentary out in JCCP! In which I try to solve the problem of incomparable effect size estimates in clinical trials by recommending a standard, one-size-fits-most way to compute the standardized mean difference (SMD; e.g., Cohen’s d) in psychology trials. doi.org/10.1037/ccp0...
🚨 Now out in @jamapsychiatry.com 🚨 Are people with depression less responsive to rewards on social media, just like in the lab? Actually…quite the opposite! 🧵 📄 Read the paper here: jamanetwork.com/journals/jam...
The Reinforcement Effect of Social Media Likes in Depression
This study investigates individual differences in the effect of social media likes on posting behavior and their association with and specificity to depressive psychopathology.
jamanetwork.com
New commentary out in JCCP! In which I try to solve the problem of incomparable effect size estimates in clinical trials by recommending a standard, one-size-fits-most way to compute the standardized mean difference (SMD; e.g., Cohen’s d) in psychology trials. doi.org/10.1037/ccp0...
This is an excellent (and entertaining) critique of The Body Keeps the Score, and impressively accurate on the science @ifbookspod.bsky.social podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/i...
The Body Keeps The Score
Podcast Episode · If Books Could Kill · June 18 · 1h 50m
podcasts.apple.com
At the end of the term I asked my college creative wriing students to submit anonymous thoughts on AI. No real surprises: Mood ranges from resignation to despair, capitulation from embittered erosion of standards to total, feelings of betrayal from deep to furious. 1/
Hey, getting scammed by taxi systems you don’t understand is a god-given right of all international travelers
The City Reporter@thecityreporter.nyc · 2mo agoWith more than 1 million visitors expected to descend on the city for the World Cup, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey is pledging to crack down on hustlers who scam unsuspecting marks into pricey, unlicensed rides at area airports. www.thecityreporter.nyc/2026/06/09/a...
Don't be shy to take on a little two-week side project. These five months will be the most precious three years of your academic journey.
1/7 Clinical trials should preregister analyses. But even careful plans leave room for defensible alternatives, and problems often arise that create decisions no one anticipated. Instead of picking just one defensible option, what if you ran them all? New paper in @collabrapsychology.bsky.social
AI seems to be the topic of the year — nearly every conversation I have in my role as academic lead for good research practice touches on it in some way. I’d like to lay out my developing thoughts for conversation and critique. (1/7)
1/7 The Reliable Change Index is supposed to be a common ruler for deciding whether a patient truly improved. But what if that ruler changes size from study to study? Recent paper in the International Journal of Social Research Methodology: doi.org/10.1080/13645579.2025.2585286
When drawing links between health and the gut microbiome, the obvious explanation that should be ruled out first is always disease—>diet—>microbiome (or M—>diet and disease—>microbiome). Microbiome—>disease is the least likely explanation by a light year www.sciencealert.com/parkinsons-l...
Parkinson's Link to Gut Bacteria Hints at Unexpectedly Simple Treatment
Scientists have suspected for some time that the link between our gut and brain plays a role in the onset of Parkinson's disease.
sciencealert.com