ManyPrimates-2021

Collaboration and Open Science Initiatives in Primate Research

• File: data/review/fulltext/
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/8w7zd
• OpenAlex ID: W4251805646

Characteristics of the paper

• Type of paper (e.g., tips, example): example
• Themes (e.g., tools, organization): organization, tools
• Other keywords (e.g., newcomers):

Tools

Specific tools mentioned - their function - where in the researh process used

• Github - version control - all
• Registered reports - help designing analysis to prove specific hypothesis - planning
• p-curve software - helps avoiding overrepresantation of positive results - analysis
• A.P.E.S Wiki - open access platform for standardized research and conservation of the data - dissemination
• PRIMatE Research Exchange - platform to exchange data, ideas and protocols - dissemination

Organizational structure for open collaboration

Setting up a network of collaborators

• ManyPrimates wanted a lasting infrastructure
• They developed a mailing list where researchers can exchange their ideas and analysis.
• They developed a twitter (now X) account to disseminate and extend their work to other researchers.

Setting up the bases for collaboration and a test example to educate people in open sciences

• They developed ethical guidelines for all collaborators (non-invasive research, always open science, author list)
• Research questions are selected democratically - proposals for projects are submitted and members vote to select which projects will be carried out
• They ran a pilot study that tried replicating analysis on short-term memory with more sample size.
• They preregistered protocols, created code and hosted data in repositories so that other coworkers can run the analysis systematically.
• Data was collected.
• Other workforce merged the data and visualized the results.
• With this pipeline, they decided to run other analysis. This highlights the importance of a good test study.
• Task forces within the project prepared different materials they then uploaded to github and pre-register

Educational perspectives

• Large-scale collaboration are a great opportunity for making more researchers get in touch with open science practices.
• Creating websites like A.P.E.S Wiki or a mailing list creates a network of researchers that can follow similar practices.
• Replication studies like the mentioned MP1 project on short-term memory can be of great educational value and help set up and infrastructure to promote openness.

Barriers

Barriers for open science

• Pre-registration might neglect innovation due to their rigid structure, but creates very solid results.