Research biases

Are the pools of subjects that we test always representative of the wider populations of animals that we seek to understand? And how do the decisions that we make when we design our experiments affect the behaviours that we are trying to measure? These questions have important implications for understanding why research findings sometimes do not replicate and for drawing more meaningful comparisons between similar studies.

STRANGE

Often, the animals that we test are not fully representative of the wider populations that we seek to understand. The STRANGE framework aims to encourage us to think about how we design experiments to minimise sampling biases and presents positive steps that we can take to more clearly declare and discuss the impact and implications of sampling biases where these are unavoidable. You can read the original STRANGE paper here.

Experimental design

How do the test procedures and the physical apparatus that we use in our experiments affect the behaviour of the animals that we are attempting to measure? Do the dimensions of the testing arenas or the way we present the stimuli matter? We are attempting to answer question such these through experimental investigations and metanalyses of existing literature.