De reproduceerbaarheid van het onderzoek in Vlaanderen

Position Paper | Year 2022
The reproducibility of research in Flanders: fact finding and recommendations
KVAB Thinkers' report 2022
Class of the Humanities, Class of Technical Sciences

The report explores three aspects of reproducibility with the goal of providing recommendations to stakeholders about how to ensure reproducibility. Replication perse is only one aspect of reproducibility, and to thoroughly understand reproducibility requires casting a wider net that includes components such as transparency, research practices, and the role of theory in science. Second, the relationship between these components and reproducibility can be complex and counterintuitive.  Third for science to yield robust, reproducible and credible knowledge, we must transform research institutions, evaluation and practices so that, ultimately, it is no longer necessary to talk about it. We will have achieved reproducibility when we no longer debate it.

Based on their deep insights in the nature and the operational elements of the research process, and extensive conversations with the stakeholders in Flanders,  the thinkers have obtained  a good perspective on the status of reproducibility of research in Flanders. They appreciate the efforts and initiatives to enhance it, and give recommendations for the research assessment, a broader understanding of reproducibility, the full diversity of stakeholders, building a research culture of open discussion, implement science communication strategies that focus on the engagement of multiple publics into research processes.