The LMU Open Science Center is founded!

In recent years, headlines have repeatedly reported that scientific results could not be reproduced, even under the same experimental conditions. The speaker of the newly founded LMU Open Science Center (LMU OSC), sociologist Prof. Dr. Katrin Auspurg, explains these alarming findings: “Competition for funding and professorships has led people to publish as many articles as possible in the shortest time possible in a marketing-effective way. This incentive structure often negatively affects the truthfulness of published research.”

Transparency in research: The foundation for credible and successful science

For a long time, science organizations have been demanding data and results generated in publicly funded research projects to be made openly available in order to enable reexamination and further analyses.

“In times where we see frequent debates over fake news, it is very important to strengthen the trust in science”, clarifies the center's managing director, psychologist Dr. Felix Schönbrodt, who played a major role in establishing the Center. “The Open Science Center is a strong signal: We stand for integrity and reliability and support these principles in our teaching, our personnel decisions, as reviewers, and especially in our daily practice as researchers.”

Thereby the competitiveness of the university is increased as many research funders, such as the ERC or the newly founded “Open Research Funders Group” emphasize the topic Open Science in their funding guidelines for new research projects.

Putting Open Science into action at LMU Munich

Prof. Dr. Barbara Conradt, the LMU’s vice president for research and diversity, pointed out, that “first and foremost, excellent research means producing correct and replicable results. In this respect, the foundation of the Open Science Center complements the LMU’s bigger strategy of supporting good scientific practice.”

the OSC seeks to accomplishing this goal by offering public talks, trainings programs and workshops for scientists at all stages of their career, from PhD students to professors. Furthermore, the Center plans to conduct “research about research”, by investigating the scientific process itself. Thereby, psychological, sociological, and statistical/methodical aspects are investigated which lead to biased or wrong results in the scientific literature.

The Center’s 17 founding members come from ten different scientific fields, ranging from sociology to geography. Three complete faculties of the LMU – the Faculty of Medicine, the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, as well as the Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences – have joined the Center’s mission. Additionally, the Leibniz Supercomputing Centre (LRZ) and the University Library are supporting the Open Science Center.

All members of the LMU Open Science Center share one common goal: Fostering good science and generating reliable knowledge through transparent and replicable research. For a society that can trust in it.

Press Release: tba