(Image: Paul Stuart)
When the clinical epidemiologist John Ioannidis published a paper entitled “Why most published research findings are false” in 2005, he made a lot of scientists very uncomfortable. The study was the result of 15 years’ work cataloguing the factors that plague the interpretation of scientific results, such as the misuse of statistics or poor experimental design. Ioannidis tells Jim Giles why his conclusion is not as depressing as it appeared, and what he is doing to improve matters.
You’ve been described as the “man who would prove all studies wrong”. What was it like to find yourself in this role?…
