Oct. 19, 2026

Researching Honesty: Can you trust the data? Part 1

Show Notes
Chapters

A famous Harvard researcher. A blockbuster finding about honesty. Suspicious data, failed replications, and a $25 million lawsuit. Welcome to one of the strangest research misconduct scandals in recent memory. In the first of two episodes about the Francesca Gino case, we investigate a famous experiment claiming that signing an honesty pledge at the top of a form makes people less likely to cheat. We follow the trail from a failed replication to some extraordinary detective work involving an Excel spreadsheet—and conduct a little statistical sleuthing of our own. Along the way, we discover how suspicious changes to a handful of observations can alter the story a scientific study tells.

Statistical topics

Statistical sleuthing
Data integrity
Data management
Replication
Sensitivity analysis
Effect sizes
Statistical significance
Reproducibility
Spreadsheets
Conceptual replication
Direct replication
CalcChain

Methodologic Morals

“There's cleaning your data, and then there's laundering your data.”
“Good data record keeping is still sexy. Version control, baby.”

References

Published research

Shu LL, Mazar N, Gino F, Ariely D, Bazerman MH. Signing at the beginning makes ethics salient and decreases dishonest self-reports in comparison to signing at the end. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2012;109(38):15197-15200. Retracted. doi:https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1209746109
Kristal AS, Whillans AV, Bazerman MH, Gino F, Shu LL, Mazar N, Ariely D. Signing at the beginning versus at the end does not decrease dishonesty. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2020;117(13):7103-7107. doi:https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1911695117
Retraction for Shu et al., Signing at the beginning makes ethics salient and decreases dishonest self-reports in comparison to signing at the end. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2021;118(38):e2115397118. doi:https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2115397118

Data Colada investigations

Simonsohn U, Simmons JP, Nelson LD. Evidence of fraud in an influential field experiment about dishonesty. Data Colada. August 17, 2021. https://datacolada.org/98
Simonsohn U, Simmons JP, Nelson LD. Data falsificada (part 1): “Clusterfake.” Data Colada. June 17, 2023. https://datacolada.org/109
Simonsohn U, Simmons JP, Nelson LD. Data falsificada (part 2): “My class year is Harvard.” Data Colada. June 20, 2023. https://datacolada.org/110
Simonsohn U, Simmons JP, Nelson LD. Data falsificada (part 3): “The cheaters are out of order.” Data Colada. June 23, 2023. https://datacolada.org/111
Simonsohn U, Simmons JP, Nelson LD. Data falsificada (part 4): “Forgetting the words.” Data Colada. June 30, 2023. https://datacolada.org/112
Simonsohn U, Simmons JP, Nelson LD. Exhibits 3, 4, and 5. Data Colada. September 16, 2023. https://datacolada.org/114
Simmons JP. Harvard's Gino report reveals how a dataset was altered. Data Colada. July 9, 2024. https://datacolada.org/118

Additional resources

Lessig L. The Gino Case. Website and podcast series presenting arguments challenging Harvard's research misconduct findings. https://theginocase.info/
Gino v Harvard University. CourtListener. Federal court docket and publicly available filings. https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/67659904/gino-v-harvard-university/
Simonsohn U, Simmons JP, Nelson LD. Data Falsificada. ResearchBox. Research data, analysis code, and supporting materials accompanying the Data Colada investigations. https://researchbox.org/1630.34
Kristal AS, et al. Research materials and data accompanying Signing at the beginning versus at the end does not decrease dishonesty. Open Science Framework. https://osf.io/4b7mu/overview
Correction for Kristal et al., Signing at the beginning versus at the end does not decrease dishonesty. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2026;123(27):e2610441123. doi:https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2610441123
Harvard Business School. Investigative report concerning allegations of research misconduct involving Francesca Gino. Harvard Business School Research Integrity Investigation Report. 2023. Accessed October 18, 2026. https://datacolada.org/wp-content/uploads/Harvard-Report-on-Gino.pdf