The disembowelment of cognitive pollution research

From Gender and the dynamics of economics seminars by  Tyler Cowen.  The paper he is referencing is Gender and the Dynamics of Economics Seminars by Pascaline Dupas, Alicia Sasser Modestino, Muriel Niederle, and Justin Wolfers.  

From the Abstract:

This paper reports the results of the first systematic attempt at quantitatively measuring the seminar culture within economics and testing whether it is gender neutral. We collected data on every interaction between presenters and their audience in hundreds of research seminars and job market talks across most leading economics departments, as well as during summer conferences.  We find that women presenters are treated differently than their male counterparts. Women are asked more questions during a seminar and the questions asked of women presenters are more likely to be patronizing or hostile. These effects are not due to women presenting in different fields, different seminar series, or different topics, as our analysis controls for the institution, seminar series, and JEL codes associated with each presentation. Moreover, it appears that there are important differences by field and that these differences are not uniformly mitigated by more rigid seminar formats. Our findings add to an emerging literature documenting ways in which women economists are treated differently than men, and suggest yet another potential explanation for their under-representation at senior levels within the economics profession.

It is one of those insufferable academic research papers designed to discover what they imagine to be true.  The sample size, methodology, independence, lack of controls, and effect size are all so miserable that it is obvious what is going on.  That such bright people should be designing and presenting such cognitive pollution is a crime.

But that is one of the pleasant aspects of the commenter community at Marginal Revolution.  Very bright people taking the time to examine the details.  Two minutes to read the Abstract, one minute of reflection about how many holes there are in the approach and then five minutes reading the comments to see that your logical assumptions are confirmed by others who got into the nitty gritty.  

The commenters save an immense amount of time.  Too bad they are being fed such nonsense in the first place.  It is like watching seeing someone throw a wounded chicken towards a pack of hyena.  You know what is going to happen, but it is hard not to watch.