Retraction appears for paper by social psychologist Dirk Smeesters

A paper by Dirk Smeesters — the former Erasmus University social psychology professor investigated for serious irregularities in his work — has been retracted.

The study, “Visual perspective influences the use of metacognitive information in temporal comparisons,” appeared in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology earlier this year. Here’s the notice, which doesn’t quite say “fraud”:

This retraction follows the results of an investigation by the Committee for Inquiry into Scientific Integrity, Erasmus University Rotterdam, into the work of Dirk Smeesters. The Committee concluded that the findings of, and data collected by, Smeesters could not be confirmed. Smeesters also disclosed that he had removed data related to this article in order to achieve a significant outcome. The University therefore requested the retraction of this article. His co-authors were unaware of his actions and were not involved in the collection of the data in question.

The retraction is the first of two, according to Erasmus.

The investigation into Smeesters’ work was prompted by Uri Simonsohn, whose questions also led to an inquiry into research by psychologist Lawrence Sanna. Sanna also resigned, from the University of Michigan.

Please see another post with a second (actually first) retraction from Smeesters.

Hat tip: ScientificFraud