Replication studies can be a useful teaching tool because they provide basic experience in critically reading and evaluating an article, finding research materials, collecting data, analyzing data, and critically evaluating results. Beyond that, it does not let students focus on significance value of the result, but instead on the mechanics of research. With the helpful guides of the original article and their instructor students are able to participate in all of the steps of empirical research, which will prepare them for more complex studies and ideas in the future. We advise instructors to review the guidelines of convincing replications in the Replication Recipe by Brandt et al. (please see [here][1]). The Replication Recipe should inform instructors of what steps are necessary to conduct convincing replications.
**DIRECT REPLICATION:** For many instructors, using a replication study for a course or a student's independent research project will entail a basic replication of a published study. This includes:
1. Gather the relevant materials / research protocols to conduct the study.
2. Finalize the research materials for data collection
3. Plan the desired sample size
4. Create an analysis plan
5. Pre-register the study
6. Collect data and recruit participants
7. Analyze the data following the analysis plan
8. Write-up the results
9. Compare the results with the original findings
**DIRECT + ADVANCED REPLICATION:** Other instructors, especially those teaching more advanced students, will wish to go beyond the basic steps of a replication and encourage students to think about additional hypotheses. This is a great opportunity to encourage students to think about how a study relates to other findings in psychology and how a theory might make predictions about a particular study. For example, one possibility is to encourage students to come up with theoretically relevant and plausible moderators of the original studies findings. These could be individual difference measures assessed at *the entire end* of the study, or new experimental conditions to compare to the original study's experimental findings. These types of activities and thinking allows instructors to benefit from replication studies, but also encourages students to think of their own hypotheses.
Comments from Instructors for other Instructors:
Be careful to clearly distinguish between the requirements for completing their study for class requirements and CREP Research Award criteria. For instance, the Minimum N for a CREP Research Award might not be feasible to be collected in one semester. Students should be encouraged to complete the minimum N to meet Award qualifications in a following semester if this should arise.
**If you have any questions or concerns, please visit our FAQ page [https://osf.io/hocj2/wiki/home/][3]**
**If you have further questions, please feel free to contact one of our Advisory Board Leaders: [https://osf.io/zt4k5/wiki/home/][2]**
***Instructors***
1. *Contact CREP and become a contributor:* So that we can keep track of progress, please contact us ([graheje@plu.edu][1]) if you intend to us the CREP in your class. As a contributor, your work with this project can be recorded and recognized by the academic community, and as part of your faculty tenure and review process.
2. *Share list with class:* We recommend first spending 20-30 minutes discussing the CREP studies as potential class projects with your students while reviewing this OSF page. Then we suggest assigning students to review and summarize one of the 5 studies that they find most interesting. In the following class, students interested in the same study can work together.
3. *Encourage students to follow the Instructions to Student Contributors:* Once students identify a study, they should follow the steps for Instructions to Student Contributors below.
4. *Guide the Projects to Completion:* We will help where possible in addressing methodology questions (such as minimum acceptable sample size and identifying the correct materials, but we thank you for the guidance that you will provide your students in completing a high quality project.
Resources
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See the [Files section][4] of this Node to download a PDF of the listed papers.
- Frank, M. C., & Saxe, R. (2012). [Teaching replication][5]. *Perspectives
on Psychological Science, 7*, 600-604.
- Grahe, J. E., Reifman, A., Hermann, A. D., Walker, M., Oleson, K.
C., Nario-Redmond, M., & Wiebe, R. P. (2012). [Harnessing the
undiscovered resource of student research projects][6]. *Perspectives
on Psychological Science, 7*, 605-607.
[1]: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022103113001819
[2]: http://If%20you%20have%20any%20questions%20or%20concerns,%20please%20feel%20free%20to%20contact%20one%20of%20our%20Advisory%20Board%20Leaders:%20https://osf.io/zt4k5/wiki/home/
[3]: http://osf.io/hocj2/wiki/home/
[4]: http://openscienceframework.org/project/WFC6u/node/XQvE3/files
[5]: http://openscienceframework.org/project/WFC6u/node/XQvE3/files/Teaching_Replication_-_Frank_and_Saxe_2012_-_Perspectives_on_Psychological_Science.pdf
[6]: http://openscienceframework.org/project/WFC6u/node/XQvE3/files/Harnessing_the_Undiscovered_Resource_of_Student_Research_Projects_-_Grahe_et_al_2012_-_Perspectives_on_Psychological_Science.pdf