When Psychology Went to War With Itself

A month ago, someone shoved me into a time machine.

It happened on social media, naturally. Someone commented on one of my essays and, in my reading, ascribed bad intent to what I wrote. Uncharitable interpretations are the internet’s native tongue, so I almost scrolled past. Then I saw who wrote it. The commenter was an infamous psychologist who has been singing the same sad song for over a decade. Suddenly it was 2016 again. I could almost smell the sock puppets.

For those who weren’t there, the mid 2010s were when psychology went to war with itself over replication and reform. The battles played out daily on Twitter and Facebook, and for one regrettable year, I volunteered as referee. I moderated a Facebook group meant to keep the fights civil. Oh what a fool I was!

I wrote about that time as a paid post over a year ago, but think it deserves a second life in light of last month’s exchange. Below is a lightly edited version, now free for everyone. The wars are mostly over, but some combatants haven’t been told the bums lost. The bums always lose.

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I had a front row seat to the replication wars in social psychology. Not just as an active participant who evolved from true believer to full-on skeptic, but as a moderator for a year of a Facebook group where many of the fiercest battles unfolded.

It was, without question, the worst year of my academic life.

The year was 2016. Psychology was at war with itself. Social psychology had split into factions: younger scholars championing reform on one side, established figures defending traditional methods on the other—though you could certainly find older and younger scholars in both camps. My own position was evolving rapidly, but I remained caught between worlds in multiple ways: no longer young, but I didn’t feel established either. I remember my amusement when people online referred to me as a “senior and respected scholar.” They were talking about me?

The battlefield of this civil war was primarily social media. At that time, psychology Twitter and Facebook were must-see TV. I'd check them before class, after lecturing, and again at home. You wouldn't want to miss a minute because there was so much drama, practically every single day.

On Monday a paper would drop failing to replicate some sacred finding: “Huh, it turns out that the clothes you wear does not impact cognitive control; who knew?” On Tuesday the critics would gloat, “You see how shitty your so-called science is?” On Wednesday, the establishment would question the replicators’ abilities and motives: “Those second-stringers are trying to get famous by tearing down actual scientists.” On Thursday, some of the critics would escalate to personal attacks: “Yes, Professor X is famous, but he got famous by scientific doping!” On Friday, someone would break down in tears, crying “Shameless little bullies!” Rinse and repeat, with clockwork regularity.

This happened week in and week out for what seemed like an eternity. The replication crisis had been brewing since around 2011, with tensions escalating each year. By 2016, the field had already been through several years of increasingly hostile exchanges. The intensity of these battles made what was objectively a few years feel like decades. As much as I found this entertaining, in a horrifying sort of way, I also felt there could be a better way. Surely, someone could be the adult in the room and help us talk through our issues without so much acrimony.

Into this chaos stepped University of California Davis professor Alison Ledgerwood, who had the noble but naïve idea to create a moderated Facebook group called “PsychMAP” (Psychological Methods and Practices)[1]. The concept was simple: a space where psychologists could discuss replications, methodological reforms, and critique papers—but do it civilly, without the name-calling that had become standard everywhere else. The key to this group was that it would be actively moderated.

Unmoderated forums had devolved into hostile places where aggressive voices dominated, creating a climate of fear. Even tenured scholars hesitated to engage, worried they'd be branded ignoramuses for expressing uncertainty. And without their participation, how could the field truly take stock of itself?

When Alison invited me to moderate alongside her, I jumped at the chance. My temperament leans authoritarian, so being a tone cop came naturally. We established ground rules: criticize ideas, not people. No ascribing malicious intent. No bullying.

A field won't take stock and actually change if there's no communication across divides. People needed space to work through these difficult realizations without being attacked, even if their initial reactions were defensive or misguided. And the only way we could have real conversation across “party lines” would be to turn down the heat. So, we tried something different, limiting certain forms of expression in service of deeper dialogue.

Some scholars understandably bristled at the idea of not being able to fully express themselves. Critics accused us of censorship. Nevertheless, I truly believed we could have searching conversations about our collective troubles, free of rancour.

Man, was I wrong.

Moderating the group quickly became a full-time job. We were monitoring discussions day and night until we eventually realized we needed to close the group in the evenings and on Sundays just to maintain our sanity. At one point, we even added a third moderator—God bless you, John Sakaluk—to handle the volume. We'd routinely have to pull people aside to reprimand them, or step in when conversations started heating up. We had to do this so often that we developed a script. We would flag the offending post with an image of a cup of coffee—think of it as a timeout with caffeine—and then privately DM the offender explaining what the issue was.

The day-to-day chaos was exhausting. One minute I'd be mediating a heated exchange between a senior researcher and their critic, the next I'd be fielding complaints about someone's tone. But nothing prepared me for the carnival of sock puppets that emerged—fake identities created by tenured professors (all dudes) to hide behind. At one point, we had at least three of these puppets running amok.

There was the notorious provocateur posing as “Jasmine Bond,” a supposedly demure Singaporean graduate student. We found him out when he accidentally posted under his real, not sock puppet account.

Then there was the very famous scholar who couldn't handle his very famous paper failing to replicate, so he transformed into a digital graffiti artist, spamming the board daily in protest. Everyone complained about him—except for one lone champion, whose stylistic tics and particular obsessions made it painfully obvious who was really typing.

Most bizarre was the husband of a once prominent researcher who created a fake identity to defend his wife's honour, only to be immediately recognized by someone else in our community who actually knew the person he was impersonating. The whole experience was every bit as stupefying as anything you'd see in Los Angeles County.

Perhaps the most absurd aspect of moderating PsychMAP, though, was receiving private messages from tenured professors—grownups with PhDs and fancy job titles—tattling on each other like middle schoolers. “So-and-so is being mean to me!” “Did you see what he posted?” “Can you please intervene?”

Looking back, maybe none of this should have been surprising. This was no ordinary moment. PsychMAP formed precisely when our field's foundations were collapsing in real time. Many couldn't process how they'd contributed to psychology's dismal record; denial was rampant.

As much as I wished people could talk openly and dispassionately about theirs and other’s research, I now see that I was naïve. Put yourself in the position of a scholar in the twilight of their career, suddenly learning that the methods they used to draw inferences and write all those famous papers are now being called research malpractice, possibly even fraud. Wouldn't you fight to preserve what you believed was true—and to protect your legacy?

But even without a legacy to worry about, the instinct for self-preservation runs deep. That’s why even the most impartial criticism of one’s work feels like a personal attack. It is simply too easy to conflate legitimate criticism with bullying. I was foolish to believe people could readily be objective about their own research. In the abstract, we all considered ourselves rational truth-seekers above petty biases. In practice, when our papers get criticized, even kindly and with an even hand, it fucking hurts.

After a year of this madness, I quit moderating and left the group entirely. I just couldn’t take it anymore. All the fighting got to me, and I just wanted to go to my own little corner and stop playing referee.

Things are much calmer today. The reformers won—methodological changes once deemed radical are now mainstream, and many vocal critics hold positions of power.

But I do wonder if psychology's revolution could have been bloodless. In a recent conversation, my friend Eli Finkel noted that this tension between incremental and revolutionary change characterizes many transformative movements. Perhaps PsychMAP's failure wasn't in attempting moderation, but in my belief that reform could happen purely through civil discourse. Status quo defenders have too much invested in being right; some only change when pushed harder than polite conversation allows. Can radical transformation ever happen without metaphorical bloodshed? In my more honest moments, I suspect not.

The replication wars are now mostly behind us. We've grown thicker skin as a field and normalized criticism—science's essential self-correction mechanism. Looking at the unmoderated hellscape of Twitter today, I've gained new appreciation for the value of moderation, even if we were a bit heavy-handed. Sometimes you need to be told to shut the fuck up, Donny.

But I still wouldn't moderate PsychMAP again. There aren't enough White Russians in the world to make me deal with another sock puppet named Jasmine Bond.

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[1] Much to my surprise, PsychMAP is still around, though it does not look to be a bumping place anymore. I have no idea if it is still moderated.