The main goal of the current project was to execute a SECOND independent direct replication of Slepian, Masicampo, Toosi, and Ambady’s (2012, JEP:G) main finding from Experiment 1. Consistent with an embodiment account, Slepian et al. found that individuals who thought and wrote about a big (compared to small) secret estimated a pictured hill as steeper, suggesting that holding secrets weigh people down (Proffitt, 2006). In other words, “important meaningful secrets affected individuals…as if they were physically burdened” (Slepian et al., p. 623).
We executed a high-powered (estimated power of .9998) pre-registered independent direct replication using exactly the same measures, manipulations, instructions (exact instructions and manipulation acquired from Slepian), and sampling approach (online sample using Amazon’s Mechanical Turk website). The primary goal was to attempt to corroborate Slepian et al.'s finding by seeing if the finding generalizes to a new (and larger) sample of individuals.
This is one of two pre-registered replication attempts (see [Independent Direct Replication #1 of Slepian et al][1] for the other). Both attempts failed to replicate Slepian et al.'s Study 1 original finding. See [LeBel & Wilbur (in press, PBR)][2] for full analysis and report of our results. The figure below presents our results using [Simonsohn's (2013)][3] approach to interpreting replication results; from this perspective, both replication attempts would be classified as "conclusive failures".
![enter image description here][4]
[1]: https://openscienceframework.org/project/w6kV5/wiki/home/
[2]: http://publish.uwo.ca/~elebel/documents/l&w%28inpress,pbr%29.pdf
[3]: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2259879
[4]: http://publish.uwo.ca/~elebel/documents/simonsohnApproachFigure.jpg