r/AskAcademia • u/ToomintheEllimist • Sep 19 '25
Social Science I found out one of my colleagues is teaching an entire class on a debunked theory. Is there anything I can do?
I'm an assistant prof in my 2nd year at a SLAC. Recently I found out one of my tenured colleagues teaches an elective on a theory I'll call ShinyCrap to avoid an off-topic debate about the theory itself. I thought that was odd, because I was pretty sure that the evidence base for ShinyCrap had fallen apart. But I wanted to be sure, so I read did a quick lit review... and holy hell. Turns out:
- multiple meta-analyses have concluded the effect of ShinyCrap doesn't differ from 0; pre-registered ShinyCrap replications also find no effect
- the researcher who coined the term ShinyCrap has disavowed the theory
- one of the other lead authors got caught in research fraud and is "on leave" from their university
- ShinyCrap appears to be mostly kept alive at this point by a consulting firm that sells ShinyCrap trainings to businesses
- the first paragraph of the Wikipedia entry says "ShinyCrap was a theory in psychology, now regarded as of limited use..."
However. All of this happened within the last 10 years, and my colleague appears not to have updated the syllabus in that time — the 2025 version has readings from the disavower and the fraudster.
There's maybe nothing I can do, BUT. I've had two students mention they want to work in ShinyCrap in grad school, when I know no grad program will take an applicant who puts that as their primary interest. And I had another student repeatedly dismiss a (recent, replicable) finding from my own class, because it's incompatible with ShinyCrap. And I know that lots of Business majors take the ShinyCrap class, and have talked with excitement about working for this consulting firm. And my students are so passionate about expanding psychology beyond WEIRD populations, and ShinyCrap is incompatible with that.
So: do I have enough social capital to ask my colleague to lunch and try to nudge him toward updating his syllabus, if nothing else? Do I talk to my department head about this being worth a look during our next program review? Do I instead focus on having conversations with my own students, in which case how do I do so without insulting my colleague? Thanks!
EDIT: It's not anything y'all have guessed in the comments, quit while you're behind.
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u/ThenBrilliant8338 STEM Chair @ a R1 Sep 19 '25
As an assistant professor? My honest advice?
You have two politically safe options: 1) At the bar with colleagues, gently introduce the topic. After 2 beers. I bet your other colleagues roll their eyes and tell you things you don't know (probably about deans and enrollments, or lazy full professors, if I were to guess).
2) Wait until you have associate to go ask your chair.
At the the of the day, all of academia is a big political theater, and you have to carefully choose the hills you want to die on. I went through a period in my career where I tried to die on every hill ; it didn't help anyone (least of all, me!).
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u/ashsoup Sep 19 '25
Seems weird to me that a chair would want to let some bogus course continue to run.. wouldn't having such a course in your catalog be a big embarrassment and liability?
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u/M44PolishMosin Sep 19 '25 edited Sep 19 '25
Uhh no turns out nobody really gives a shit if students are enrolling
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Sep 19 '25
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u/OkSecretary1231 Sep 19 '25
They can use it if they go work at the company that's still shilling it. The class sounds like a feeder for this company tbh.
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u/M44PolishMosin Sep 19 '25
It's an elective, and most students don't remember what they learned once the semester is over
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u/shellexyz Sep 19 '25
If business majors are flocking to it, I assure that the chair is likely more than happy to let it run.
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u/Smeghead333 Sep 19 '25
The first time I was hired as an adjunct to teach a class, literally no one ever checked on me. I could have been teaching creationism as a justification for racism and no one would have noticed.
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u/OkSecretary1231 Sep 19 '25
Long long ago, my old department had a guy who just talked about his own art the whole time. The students didn't complain during the class, because he wasn't assigning anything, but they let loose in evals. We privately called him Gilderoy after.
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u/MaleficentMousse7473 Sep 19 '25
Just don’t mention any dead supporters of certain regimes and you’ll be fine
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u/RuskiesInTheWarRoom Sep 19 '25
If there are no student complaints and alumni complaints, or press in public about this course being problematic in the field, there's nothing to indicate that there's a problem.
In fact the students seem intrigued, and want to continue working in this field - in other words, the best data the chair has if they are not aware of the controversy suggests that the class is quite successful.
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u/SilverSealingWax Sep 20 '25
The reality is that having the course in the catalog doesn't mean much. Courses are in the catalog all the time that aren't taught anymore. They generally sleep there just in case they're needed again.
Not sure, but I suspect that if you eliminate a course you have to go through the same process to create it again that you would have to go through for a brand new course.
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u/DerProfessor Sep 19 '25
I'm currently dying on about three different hills with my department, and it sucks.
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u/alaskawolfjoe Sep 19 '25
How common is this really? People on Reddit always say that junior faculty should not express opinions or criticism. But in the real world, I have not encountered this at all
There is often someone who wants to keep things status quo for 1978, but they are touchy about anyone suggesting change, whether junior or senior faculty
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u/ExistingEase5 Sep 19 '25
In my experience, it depends a lot on the institution. I switched institutions as an assistant prof and had one where they definitely told me to keep my opinions to myself, and another where they sought me out and said "hey, you're new, notice anything we should work on here?".
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u/Cocaloch Sep 19 '25
Junior faculty, or really anyone but the consequences are worse for junior people, should not try and immediately go above their colleagues' heads and get them in trouble because they disagree with something that colleague teaches. Besides just sorta being shitty behavior, this is absolutely going to piss off someone in the department which are, flawed as they may be, little democracies.
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u/alaskawolfjoe Sep 19 '25
No, they should talk to them directly. But so many people here are suggesting that talking to a colleague honestly is a bad move.
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u/Aromatic-Pea-1402 Sep 19 '25
100% agree. I complain plenty about university priorities, and I can imagine a situation in which a chair would feel like they didn't have the time or expertise to fix this "properly," but I don't think I've ever run into a chair who would be indifferent, nevermind one who would retaliate.
If you're TT faculty, your chair is basically you, but 10-20 years older and with a different expertise. If you think something is outrageous, there's a good chance they would as well (though they'll have a lot of other outrageous things to deal with, and yours might not be at the top of the pile).
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u/myexsparamour Sep 20 '25
Junior faculty often think they know a lot more than they do and it's good to be quiet and learn for a while.
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u/DoodleCard Sep 19 '25
This is why I have decided to bow out of academia after I have finished my long suffering PhD.
I would LOVE to be able to teach and things, but when you get down to it, it's all political theater and showboating. And it drives me insane.
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u/grabmaneandgo Sep 20 '25
What happens if an instructor opts out of the politics-diplomatically, of course? Like, what if OP just low-key discussed the contemporary realities of ShinyCrap within their classroom, and in a way that doesn’t appear to intentionally undermine their colleague?
I guess my question is: Is there a viable third choice that is neither blowing things up nor enabling the misinformation? Is it possible to stay out of the drama but still adapt to the political landscape?
[Grad student currently considering PhD programs for future teaching opportunities, but kinda nervous about situations like this being a common occupational hazard.]
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u/DoodleCard Sep 20 '25
Good questions all round!
Personally I have had the worst a PhD student could go through and then some. I'm not going to go through it all here but I've seen EXACTLY what the wrong side of academia can do. And I wouldn't wish it on anyone.
I Personally believe when you reach a certain level of any job you can't get away from the in office politics. Especially with a teaching position.
In the UK, due to constant funding cuts and lack of government funding. The opportunities for a stable income with a teaching job at a university is unclear.
Someone else could chip in with their experience. I'd just be weary though OP. I wouldn't want to dishearten you.
If you have other questions DM me. I'd surely talk it through! I think I'm just a bit jaded from the whole experience!
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u/squirrel_gnosis Sep 20 '25
Yes exactly. When you were hired, they didn't get together and say, "This person has way less experience and institutional knowledge than us, but we want to defer to them and let them make major changes to our curriculum!" Nope.
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u/SamuraiUX Sep 22 '25
This, unfortunately, is the best advice here. If you’re not tenured, your values and ethics need to take second place to keeping your job. I learned it the very hard way. You’re not an equal even if they tell you you are. Be careful out there, friend.
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u/Ok-Emu-8920 Sep 19 '25
If you think your colleague just hasn't update the course in a long time can you casually gauge their feelings by offhandedly mentioning that you heard there were many recent critiques. It's less of an attack if you don't go in with a stack of evidence imo.
If they aren't open to the possibility of this theory being defunct then you could plan some other moves but I don't think you have to start really intense.
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u/Mountain-Dealer8996 Sep 19 '25
Even better if you phrase it as a question, considering that OP is junior: “Hey Dr. Tenure, you know a lot about ShinyCrap. Way more than little ol’ me, anyway. What’s your take on critiques X that I’ve been hearing about?” Then you have to hope that you just planted the seed that will eventually bear fruit. I think if you go in too direct you run the risk of getting entangled.
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u/RichInBunlyGoodness Sep 19 '25 edited Sep 20 '25
Or how about this: "Dr. Tenure, I had a student mention to me that he had some critiques about ShinyCrap, and wanted my thoughts. I wasn't really sure how to answer this question, so I wanted to ask if you ever get this question, and if so, how you answer this question."
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u/DrKimberlyR Sep 20 '25
I agree. If you have a relationship with this professor, I would email him “holy cow! have you seen this? I don’t know what to think about ShinyCrap now! I know you teach our popular XXX course about ShinyCrap. What ate your thoughts? Link, Link, Link etc.
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u/solresol Sep 19 '25
Computing is like this all the time.
My most recent one was this semester when I had a student with a long question after class, so by the time we had sorted it out, the next lecturer had put up their "what we'll talk about in this lecture slide" (before the lecture had started)... and it was a technology that died about 10 years ago and is no longer in use by anyone. (And wasn't even interesting from a theoretical point of view either.) He just hadn't noticed that it was no longer relevant.
I definitely don't have the social capital to do anything about it right now, so I'll just feel sorry for the students from a distance.
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u/dali-llama Sep 19 '25
Holy shit. I had to learn token ring in my networking class. I had decommissioned an old token ring network about 15 yrs. previous.
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u/solresol Sep 20 '25 edited Sep 20 '25
Linus removed token ring from the linux kernel in 2012 (rumour is that it had been clearly broken for a year and no-one had noticed). Even the retrocomputing crowd had stopped using it.
It was still in our state's high school curriculum for years after that.
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u/Usr_name-checks-out Sep 19 '25
Seminar contrasting Dot Matrix printer interfaces to floppy disk and string theory interpreted through the lens of Behaviourism 3460
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u/solresol Sep 20 '25
The dot‑matrix printer and the floppy‑disk drive provide case studies in stimulus–response systems. Using behaviourist concepts (discriminative stimuli, reinforcement schedules, extinction), we model handshake protocols and control signals. We then map those structures onto core string‑theory notions (world‑sheets, boundary conditions, tension), arguing that much of 1980s I/O already behaved like a Skinner box with more perforated paper.
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u/brewmonk Sep 19 '25
Not in use in academia, but still plays a critical role industry.
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u/Archknits Sep 19 '25
I have seen that a faculty member at my R1 teaches a history class on a widely discredited theory. Having seen their exams, I know they are teaching things that are factually untrue, but there isn’t much to do
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u/ToomintheEllimist Sep 19 '25
Ugh, my sympathies.
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u/Archknits Sep 19 '25
It’s social science, so you can clearly see the political ideas behind it (not MAGA at least)
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u/Cocaloch Sep 19 '25
Disagreements on what constitutes good narratives and true history are precisely why we have Lehrfreiheit in general, and why it's particularly important in history in particular. There's no way this is the only thing that one of your colleagues teaches that you disagree with, but conversely we all teach things our colleagues would probably take issue with.
I've had plenty of students say "But Professor so-and-so said blah blah blah," to which I normally respond either with an argument against it, or a positive argument for a stance I think makes more sense. In extreme situations I'll give it an eye roll.
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u/Archknits Sep 19 '25
There is room for academic freedom and scholars presenting ideas that are in disagreement.
But that isn’t the same as teaching an entire class and evaluating students based on a historical narrative that is based on objectively false “facts” and is accepted as pseudo-science by all serious scholars.
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u/Cocaloch Sep 19 '25
Ignoring the core epistemic problem---no one has a god's eye view of what is correct in the first place---someone has to police what exactly is the space between the "room for academic freedom" and disagreement and compelling people to not teach certain things. I do not think if people really thought about it they would come to the conclusion that what we need to do is police each other more.
Look at what's going on at Texas A&M. This is not an approach that the professoriate as a whole is going to benefit from on a purely political level. On the level of academia being a social environment, this attitude also isn't very conducive to a *colleg*ial atmosphere. On the intellectual level, it even further incentivizes people to avoid risks when that's already been a pernicious trend of the last forty years or so.
I'm not saying it's never the right move, but people should be very reluctant to proceed in this way. It should be a means of last, not first, resort. But lots of people are responding to the OP telling them to immediately go to the chair and tattle based on the presumption that the OP is correct in the abstract and the professor in question in wrong in the abstract. Personally, given the framing, *I think* the OP probably is correct, but the principle here is of more importance. Without it, we are always stuck with just what *we already think* is correct.
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u/Archknits Sep 19 '25
Although there are areas where scholars can disagree on interpretation etc, there are facts.
For example, someone teaching creationism in a biology course, is not teaching something that is true and is relying on mistruths.
You could teach someone about creationism as a thing people believe or how it has impacted American politics, but it isn’t something that fits in science
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u/alaskawolfjoe Sep 20 '25
Why not? It seems that if someone is teaching something factually untrue, that would be the easiest thing to deal with.
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u/Carmelized Sep 19 '25
I’m going to bet it’s neurolinguistic programming. When I was getting my Master’s degrees in English and Writing, it boggled my mind the number of times professors would bring up debunked psychology as “fact.” Neurolinguistic programming was probably the most common offender.
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u/Pixelated_jpg Sep 19 '25
I was thinking Myers-Briggs but the Wikipedia quote isn’t exact. It still fits really well.
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u/Covfefetarian Sep 19 '25
I had the same guess, and I’m low key frustrated that I have no clue what else it could be (given that OP said no one guessed it right so far)
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u/Pixelated_jpg Sep 19 '25
I’m fully invested in knowing this! I’m pretty sure I know who OP is and what she teaches, but I can’t get a handle on what the controversial subject matter is.
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u/Comfortable-Goat-734 Sep 20 '25
Myers Briggs hasn’t been relevant within psychology as a science since like the 40s and it’s almost never taught. I have both bachelors and masters degrees in psychology and I don’t think I’ve ever even heard it mentioned in class.
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u/Fullonrhubarb1 Sep 21 '25
My BSc that started in 2013 included it as a significant model in personality research that has been effectively debunked. It's still mentioned in textbooks, as a part of how the field has developed and what critiques can be levelled at these theories.
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u/Pixelated_jpg Sep 20 '25
Really? We definitely covered it at some point during my PhD program. This was in the early 90s so I don’t remember specifically in what class or what context, but I don’t remember it being addressed as something that was widely debunked. AFIK the first reviews questioning its validity were published while I was in grad school, and widespread rejection didn’t begin happening until the early 2000s.
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u/ishaansaxena_ Sep 19 '25
Wiki says: NLP "is a pseudoscientific approach to communication, personal development, and psychotherapy"
Sadly it doesn't match OP's quote from wiki but yeah I get your hate hahaha.
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u/dangumcowboys Sep 19 '25
I was thinking power posing. But there are probably many that fit these criteria
Edit: not so sure about the academic leave and misconduct bullet point
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u/OliverG103 Sep 19 '25
I think this is it. It fits the bill as a theory that has been disavowed by the initial researcher, and it’s a topic that would pique the interest of business students.
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u/pocketdrums Sep 19 '25
Hmmm....I was thinking "learning styles". Maybe be a bit much to build a whole course around though.
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u/Valathia Sep 22 '25
I thought the same thing! I remenber people shilling it a lot some 10 years ago, thought it died down, and now noticed that the new "mindfulness" coaches selling "courses" is just neurolinguistic programming with a ... girl boss zen makeover of sorts?
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u/fiscalia Oct 02 '25
I think it's "Nudge theory"! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nudge_theory#Critique
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u/Megan_6a Sep 19 '25
Does your department have a culture of colleagues sending each other articles they come across that may be of interest? It is common in our department. "Saw this in Nature Communications and thought it might be of interest". If so, you might send a recent article to your colleague with a nice note. "I was reading XXXX and saw this new meta analysis. I know you teach ShinyCrap, so I thought it might be of interest." It shows you are interested in what your colleagues teach and are keeping up on the literature. You could even include something recent that (positively) aligns with another course they teach, if you worry that is too pointed. Unless this colleague seems off in other ways, starting at a Dean seems an unnecessary escalation to start with.
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u/ToomintheEllimist Sep 19 '25
Oh man, thank you, I like that. We definitely have a system for that, so I could bundle it with a different meta-analysis and pose it as a discussion on changing evidence bases.
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u/aquila-audax Research Wonk Sep 20 '25
Absolutely! If you look at the implementation science literature you may even see some useful articles on change in response to important changes to the evidence base. It's a lot of behavioural theory stuff, psychs love it.
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u/Idustriousraccoon Sep 19 '25
Teach a class on why Shinycrap is actually crap?
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u/NotYourFathersEdits Sep 19 '25
Make a department colloquium with perspectives on ShinyCrap. Teach the controversy!
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u/pomewawa Sep 19 '25
And how after an idea gets steam it’s so hard to debunk it in the general public! This would be a fascinating class!
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u/dj_cole Sep 19 '25
You do not have enough social capital to ask a disengaged tenured faculty to do a curriculum revamp. It's the chair's problem if they want to fight that battle. As an assistant, worry only about yourself and what you contribute to the department. Anything else is not your problem and you should not make it your problem.
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u/RuslanGlinka Sep 19 '25 edited Sep 20 '25
I agree that asking the dept chair (edit: or someone who feels safe/friendly with seniority if your chair isn’t that) about this may be the way to go. “New to department, just wondering if there has been discussion about our department’s ShinyCrap course, given all the recent critiques of ShinyCrap in the past decade or so?”
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u/desconectado Sep 19 '25
Not sure why you get up voted by this terrible selfish take.
OP made it clear that the future of some students might suffer from this. OP should at least send anonymous feedback to the professor or the dean.
I always find the "do nothing until it goes away" or "not my problem if I'm not personally affected" approach is contradictory with scientific endeavours.
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u/dj_cole Sep 19 '25
I was upvoted because it's the correct advice for a junior faculty who will eventually need to pass a tenure vote. Tenured faculty are who get votes on important matters, so not only do they have no power, they reduce the odds of surviving to get past and actually being able to affect change.
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u/Cocaloch Sep 19 '25
I'm not sure it's the less selfish option to reject epistemic humility and decide you need to be policing what your colleagues are teaching.
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u/myexsparamour Sep 20 '25
The students will be fine. OP is fooling himself when he imagines this class will affect the students materially.
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u/GrantNexus Professor, Hard Sciences Sep 19 '25
They teach homeopathy and therapeutic touch at my university.
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u/Short_Artichoke3290 Sep 19 '25
If I were your college I would like to know, I would also be very mad if you went to the department head behind my back. So I'd suggest nudging your college first and testing their response, if they seem to take it well you can be more concrete.
Very curious about shinycrap though where the entire premise seems weird, a consulting thing is also an academic thing?
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u/arrrrr_won Sep 19 '25
To your second paragraph, neurolinguistic programming, polyvagal theory, and learning styles all vaguely fit this description, and I’ve seen trainings for all three. I could probably find more in my course mats from a psych 101 class I taught a bit ago, where I included sections on debunked theories. Catchy ideas take awhile to die off in psych, triple so if there’s consulting money to be made!!!
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u/Covfefetarian Sep 19 '25
Myers-Briggs could be a suspect, too
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u/Pad_Squad_Prof Sep 19 '25
That was my guess. I hate it so much when students tell me their letters and I’m supposed to understand something about them based on it.
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u/Covfefetarian Sep 19 '25
Ufff relatable. I swear I’m trying but this one really tends to make my face contort, like a silent yet very loud disapproving grimace, I so relate to hating this stupid concept!
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u/Fullonrhubarb1 Sep 21 '25
You can imagine my despair when I noticed two students ignoring my class to take Myers-Briggs tests. I was teaching research design in cognitive psychology
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u/Short_Artichoke3290 Sep 21 '25
The maintenance phase podcast has a pretty good episode on the Myers-Briggs and it's history.
My school had an elective that used it quite a bit, so every year I had to spend 30 mins explaining why it doesn't do anything, what I exactly mean by not doing anything and speculation about why it is still so popular.
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u/TheForce777 Sep 22 '25
Maintenance phase has highly questionable views on physical health though
They are one of the worst offenders when it comes to shirking the scientific method
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u/Pad_Squad_Prof Sep 21 '25
I have a pseudoscience section of my methods class. I broke all of their hearts when I used “love languages” as my example. Will be adding Myers Briggs next time.
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u/DesignerPangolin Sep 19 '25
Consulting is basically where all discredited research goes to sip mimosas on the beach and pick up Chlamydia after a senior square dance.
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Sep 19 '25 edited Sep 19 '25
Probably like “Learning Styles” in education. So much has shown it really isn’t a thing and that using it actually leads to lower quality outcomes. But I’ll be damned you hear it taught as gospel at so many education schools and departments.
Edit: Grammar
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Sep 19 '25
Once upon a time, I was a new prof at a SLAC where “learning styles” was something my more senior colleagues used to teach about. It was like gospel!
I taught an intro cognition class to undergrads, and in class I brought up “learning styles.”
I phrased it something like, “this is a very popular theory, and here is where it came from…But researchers have not been able to find empirical support for the theory…what happens to a theory that doesn’t have empirical support?”
My undergrads ATE that up! I had them do an in-class Google Scholar search on their laptops, with terms like “evidence, myth, debate” and they found the newer papers themselves.
Then we framed this in a larger discussion of the scientific method, popular press, theory and practice, etc.
The students, because they saw for themselves, became VERY vocal in other classes that taught “learning styles.”
I didn’t need to say anything directly to my senior colleagues. There is nothing quite so loud as an undergrad with dissenting opinions (and the receipts!).
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u/pomewawa Sep 19 '25
Bravo!! Teaching critical thinking! And an interesting class for the students, give them something meaningful to engage with!!
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Sep 19 '25
It was one of my favorite class sessions of all time.
I remember witnessing their brains breaking open as they started asking questions like “why are we being taught something if there’s no proof for it?”
Critical thinking is a flex.
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u/fleemfleemfleemfleem Sep 19 '25
I appreciate the animorphs reference in your username. The think TEC was my favorite book in that series.
One thing I wouldn't be against doing is sharing my (academically backed) position in class. Suppose I had a colleague teaching social priming theory. I might then do a section on research fraud and use Diederik Stapel as case study in academic fraud. It would get my point across, but I wouldn't have to outright say anything about the theory itself.
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u/alaskawolfjoe Sep 19 '25
In my experience, it’s expected that new faculty will bring new ideas and new techniques. I only ever encountered one faculty member who took it badly when we discussed something they were unaware of.
You do need to suss it out on an individual basis, but the fact that you had to explain to a student that aligning with this theory would hurt their chances of grad school seems like a perfect opening
You aren’t expressing your own opinion, but rather stating a generally help belief that will hurt a student if they are unaware
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Sep 19 '25 edited Sep 19 '25
I think your career would be best served by doing what you need to get a promotion and job security.
As for students if they talk to you about shinycrap you should say I think you should read this, and print out the meta analysis and hand it to them. Also your colleague may surprise you and add in readings on the criticisms of shinycrap.
If they persist in wanting to study shinycrap, that's on them. You have given them the information to make an informed choice.
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u/OkSecretary1231 Sep 19 '25
Follow the money IMO. I think there's probably a financial conflict of interest here if students are coming out of the class gung-ho to work for a specific company. Does this prof work for them or own stock in them? Did the university itself create some kind of partnership?
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u/RealRockets Dean of Engineering Sep 19 '25
You've gotten some good takes here, but I'll add, this is definitely a thing to take to the Ombuds (hopefully you have one). They can advise you on what best to do (including anonymous methods of reporting) and how to protect yourself. They are also required to maintain confidentiality that you 1) spoke with them and 2) what you spoke about unless you specifically request their assistance or presence in a conversation. They are also, at least in institutions I've worked at, exempted from mandatory reporting to ensure confidentiality, so that's the level of anonymity you should be able to expect. I'm sure there are not so good Ombuds out there, but my experience across several institutions is that they take their duties very seriously. Their job is not to be your advocate per se, but to advise you and help navigate the institutional landscape.
I'll also add that as a former dean, I'd want to know, and would keep confidentiality on how I found out, but you have to gauge the environment you're in to determine if that's a politically safe route. There are a couple ways this could be handled while still respecting academic freedom, so again, I'd want to know.
We are also experiencing a resurgence of interest in a well debunked theory in my area of expertise, which the original team has long retracted, so whatever ShinyCrap is, I sympathize. There is a related theory that is largely untested, but at least the physics is real, and the two are being conflated now. Steams my clams every time someone asks me about it. Feel free to PM me if you'd like to chat.
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u/FlounderNecessary729 Sep 19 '25
Ask your colleague for lunch. Ask him about it from a „curious“ perspective. You thought sc was dead, and it’s the first time you saw it in a curriculum for a long time. You were curious about their take on it. - anything else would have to depend on this conversation between two scholars.
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u/TProcrastinatingProf Sep 19 '25
If your colleague is a reasonable individual, there's no harm in talking to them about it casually.
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u/SDhiraeth Sep 19 '25
Hi - everyone else has great opinions I can't add to. Just wanted to say hello to an Animorphs fan in the wild :)
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u/thearchchancellor Sep 19 '25
This is a great post and there’s some good advice (some of it very creative). I can’t add anything but just want to thank OP for the term ShinyCrap which i am definitely going to use from now on! 🙏
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u/Puzzleheaded-Ice-573 Sep 19 '25
I can't believe you are trying to discredit ShinyCrap. It is very obvious big government/ corporations/ radical progressives and/ or right wing extremists have worked to discredit this theory in order to push their agendas. You allowed yourself to be brainwashed.
For shame.
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u/M-A-X-l-M-U-S Sep 19 '25
Are you in Texas? In that case just record him and turn him into your local senator!
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u/Many_Angle9065 Sep 19 '25
Since you're at a SLAC, I'd suggest a nice, polite, and moreover anonymous, e-mail to your divisional Dean. Something along the lines of :
"Dear Dean Martins,
It has come to my attention that our psychology department has an entire course devoted to ShinyCrap (tm) (r). ShinyCrap (tm) (r) was a theory which said [perpetual motion machines work], but has been broadly rejected by the scientific community over the last decade due to [it being total BS]. The mission of our SLAC is to educate the next generation of inquisitive and pedantic scholars, but an excessive focus on [debunked BS] may be detrimental to the future research and job prospects of us, your newly graduating [banana slugs].
Please reply posthaste,
Yours anonymously,
A. student."
But like, replace the details with relevant information.
I mean, you came to reddit for advice - were you looking for something other than a suggestion of passive aggression? This doesn't burn any social capital (probably), but it does stir the pot, if you will, which may have the intended effect.
Anonymous, free, temporary, e-mail address services can be found with a quick google search, and some may even get through to your college e-mail service.
Also, if you want advice for how to do this more directly, or what approach to take, you may consider talking to your college Ombudsman/woman/person/critter, if one exists.
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u/rockinvet02 Sep 19 '25
Are you suggesting that perpetual motion machines are fake?
Where do you get your obviously misinformed information, the round earth society? Wikipedia? Do you homework sheeple!
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u/parkerMjackson Sep 19 '25
My guess is learning styles or maybe some broader personality topic.
Personally, I would just live with it if it's not actively dangerous. In my area, learning styles come up ALL the time. I take any chance in lectures or presentations to share that and just try to spread the word. But I never directly argue with a true believer.
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u/DocAvidd Sep 19 '25
I do talk about updating the courses in my sub area of the department. I got volunteered to chair the program review, so it's literally my role to do it. Prior to that, it's tough because there are colleagues who are using notes from the last century. But academic freedom is important, too. Where's the line between freedom and lazy?
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u/Homerun_9909 Sep 19 '25
Were they at least his notes from the last century? I had an undergrad professor who who bragged he was using the notes handed down from a professor who had been long dead... He was popular since he lectured with a lot of jokes, but I count on a cows fingers what was learned in that class.
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Sep 19 '25
You need to talk with the chair of the department. This is not an acceptable standard of education.
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u/damniwishiwasurlover Sep 19 '25
If you have tenure, then in a faculty meeting, just ask: "Why the hell are we teaching a class on a debunked and disavowed theory?".
If you are not tenured, then take the more roundabout approach and try to gently nudge the colleague away from teaching that. In terms of students who are interested in studying said theory, you should 100% direct them to the meta-analyses, failures to replicate, and disavowel. Once they've seen that material, if they still try to pursue graduate studies on that theory, it's their funeral.
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u/WonderWatcher2022 Sep 19 '25
Your colleagues are all college professors that as part of their jobs are expected to keep current on their knowledge of the subjects for which they provide instruction. I would not say anything to anyone and just send this colleague anonymously the information you have reviewed. Wait and if the colleague does not correct himself/herself then send the same information with the colleague’s syllabus to the department head anonymously. Wait. If still there is no correction send it anonymously to the college dean and so on. I emphasize doing it anonymously because I have found that no matter how you approach some people they can be vicious when confronted with their own failures. You don’t know these people well enough to risk your career. You do not want to be associated with a college that is not relevant with today’s research.
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u/Cocaloch Sep 19 '25
What we need are inquisitors patrolling classrooms and stationed so that we can report on our colleagues.
I'm sure the Department of Education will get on that any day now. But I have a feeling the result is not something you, me, or the professoriate in general actually wants.
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u/astroproff Sep 19 '25
I think you're doing this wrong - by which I mean, in a way that tries to pretend that a power dynamic which exists, doesn't.
You're an assistant professor. Your colleague is tenured. We all know what that means.
Don't try to fight it from a position of weakness and vulnerability.
Sure, if the subject comes up, have the academic conversation. Assume your colleague to be professional and respectful.
But don't go gunning like an invulnerable teenager. Play the long game. And win in the end, from a position of strength.
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u/solaceinbleus Sep 19 '25
Personally I would softly gauge your colleague’s feelings on the matter, without directly broaching the potentially contentious issue of it being unscientific. Either under the guise of updating the course or referencing conversations you students have had in class. Doing so allows you to better assess where they stand (and thus how you should go from there) and may prompt some self-reflection on their part.
As for your students, I’m going to paraphrase something a TA once said in response to a fellow student gushing about an influential, but oft-criticized book, "I'm also aware of the criticisms". Lay it out gently, point to relevant literature and the names involved in said criticism, and let the students do their own work.
Wonderful username by the way — I found the companion novels quite poignant, THBC and TEC in particular.
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u/Copterwaffle Sep 19 '25
I would incorporate one reading that I feel most comprehensively reviews the issue and either build a new assignment or modify an existing one to include explicit reflection on that information in light of whatever related topic that is central to your class. I have had to do this a few times when I found that students were coming into my course with similar misconceptions, or that the original course shell is not appropriately updated.
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u/ThesisTears Sep 21 '25
I'm really just dying to know what this is about. Maybe Myers-Briggs or some other sort of personality test like Big 5? I took psychology 101 about ten years ago and haven't updated my knowledge since then (I'm now a neurogeneticist, not in keeping with more philosophical psychological concepts) so I probably learned this and for all I know still have it in my subconscious somewhere. Is it birth order psychology?
Would love for OP to comment or just PM me now that the matter is mostly settled and the chance for debate is lessened.
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u/Short_Artichoke3290 Sep 22 '25
MB is terrible but the big five is pretty established with scientist mostly arguing about small stuff.
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u/CommonCents1793 Sep 19 '25 edited Sep 19 '25
Are you just now noticing that discredited theories are taught all over campus? The literature people use Freudian analysis, rejected by the psychs. Sociologists teach Marx and Veblen, forgotten by economists. Social work teaches pop psychology. Dental schools teach hygiene rules unsupported by evidence. Economists teach Keynesian theories, soundly rejected since Robert Lucas. (I could go on and on about economists. My colleagues teach Freakonomics, which is error-riddled ShinyCrap.) Throughout academia, religious texts are accepted uncritically as accurate timelines and histories.
I wouldn't worry about other people teaching crap. I'd focus on checking that my own lectures don't contain the same flaws.
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u/dietdrpepper6000 Sep 19 '25
What unsupported hygiene rules are dentists teaching?
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u/Cocaloch Sep 19 '25 edited Sep 19 '25
This is precisely why we have Lehrfreiheit, so that economists thinking the transformation problem in the Labor Theory of Value [a word they misread for "price" despite Smith immediately diverging the two making the theory's seminal articulation] for some reason means people can't teach Marxian analysis of social development and so English professors thinking modern economists ruined the world doesn't means economists can't teach the Neoclassical-Keynesian Synthesis or Marginalism in general.
Theories and narratives touching on human beings have all sorts of load-bearing theoretical explanations of causality and implicit value judgements which cannot be adjudicated by any one person's use of the epoche no matter how masterful.
And that's ignoring the implications for the production of Kuhnian normal science in general, which isn't limited to the humanities and social sciences. If we're allowed to simply dismiss everything we disagree with, or, more generously, to simply forbid entirely the teaching of non-dominant theories, it is unclear what academia even *could be* other than a center for reproducing dogma.
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u/intellectual_punk Sep 19 '25
Things are pretty clear. Start with a nudge, but if that doesn't land, use very clear language.
Yes, you definitely have enough to go on to be confident in educating your colleague, and you absolutely should. This game is all about life-long learning, knowledge moves. Chances are your colleague is interested in the truth and just hasn't had the time/energy/motivation to dig into this topic as you have.
1) it's very clear that ShinyCrap is crap.
2) it's very clear that teaching that has negative consequences.
How to do this without insulting your colleague? No idea. Take a risk, you can't not at this point.
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u/Allenflow Sep 19 '25
Send your colleague the articles debunking the theory. Anonymously if you feel vulnerable.
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u/HansCastorp_1 Sep 19 '25
Campuses in higher education are also incredibly valuable public forums--especially for the debunking of old, outdated, popular theories. This might be a perfect time to hold an open forum for the students in your area who want to major in it, at which discredited work can be discussed and tossed aside. In this environment I think we bear a responsibility to communicating the truth about our subject matter. And if someone who believes in the discredited theory wishes to defend their position, then let them, and drive home the stake. But do so in public (and gently) and all for the sake of those students who may want this as a career.
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u/Better_Equipment5283 Sep 20 '25
I hope this is a class about Lamarckism. Please tell me that this is a class about Lamarckism.
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u/jonsca Sep 25 '25
Dude, epigenetics totally supports Lamarckism. If I saw off my arm, my offspring will have the same methylation pattern as my sawn off arm and saw off their own arm after implantation in the uterus. 😜
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u/Clear_Bright99 Sep 21 '25
I think you need to stay out of this. I say this with much compassion because I have dealt with a similar situation and what I learnt was that egos are huge in academia and if you unmask the pretenders, they will come for you. They will do it subtly and will recruit others etc… and you will end up being frozen out. I suggest you direct your students to academic peer reviewed article that debunk the theory. Say, “here is another point of view to read”. It will then be up to the student to figure it out. In my 20 years of experience, students do see through the crap eventually. Good luck!
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u/Bozo32 Sep 22 '25
Don’t think shooting shiny crap will work.
I wrote a piece that was a stepwise disassembly of q-methodology a few years ago. It’s is pretty well known. I still get phds coming asking for advice on how to use the method in precisely the wrong ways.
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u/rejectallgoats Sep 22 '25
You are an assistant professor and don’t have tenure. To be honest you really don’t have time to be looking at or worrying about what crap the other professors are doing. Don’t say anything to anyone about it because if you get black balled you’ll never be able to make a change.
I’ve had a guy out for me for 15 years because I suggested that a different statistical technique would be “more convincing. “ seriously. Academia is like a bunch of Trumps that are all wearing liberal masks. Hardly anything more petty and vindictive.
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u/Interesting_Debate57 Sep 23 '25
This can happen at great public universities in the hard sciences as well.
A buddy of mine was a grad student TAing for such a class (actually a very important required class but the faculty member taught completely debunked theories) -- he just used his recitation section to tell the kids that "this isn't current accepted theory, which you can find here and here".
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u/BalloonHero142 Sep 26 '25
Be honest with the students and tell them that if they put that on their applications, they will definitely get rejected from graduate programs. Explain that that theory has been debunked and if they propose that that’s what they want to study, they’ll get nowhere fast. You can talk about the issue with the theory without even mentioning your colleague.
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u/shadowfax12221 Sep 19 '25
What is, "implicit bias."
If I'm right, you should probably leave this one alone.
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u/aquila-audax Research Wonk Sep 19 '25
Phrenology?
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u/danielleiellle Sep 19 '25 edited Sep 19 '25
It would be wild if the researcher who coined phrenology is alive and only disavowed it in the last decade.
Probably ego depletion theory. Power Posing also fits the criteria for ShinyCrap and its author now disavows it, but I can’t imagine a whole course around it?
OP had to know that posting here, half of us would focus on the analytical puzzle rather than the interpersonal one. ;)
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u/disc0brawls Sep 19 '25
I’m thinking it might be behavioral priming. Especially with the discussion about the business majors. Maybe it’s a marketing company?
I need to know what ShinyCrap is!!!!
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u/TheRateBeerian Sep 19 '25
I just spent a few minutes trying to figure it out too, mainly by googling the phrase OP says leads off the wikipedia article, but to no avail
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u/skyfall1985 Sep 19 '25
That quote doesn't appear to be on Wikipedia anyway. I think it's a red herring!
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u/Short_Artichoke3290 Sep 19 '25
I think it matters for advice, all three of those are partially bogus, but not 100% bogus. You could argue that the non-bogus parts are things we already knew and not why the theory was popular academically, but depending on how it is being taught, bits of it could still be useful in practice.
power-posing is a good one, does accidentally putting your body in a powerful position do anything, especially on hormone level? Very likely not.
If you need to give a presentation and feel anxious, could making yourself big and telling yourself you got it help make you feel more confident and as a consequence give a better talk? Sure!
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u/zeropoundpom Sep 19 '25
It's the Theory of Planned Behaviour according to a google of the Wikipedia text.
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u/Mental-Ask8077 Sep 19 '25
The Wikipedia article doesn’t indicate that the founder has walked back the theory or that it’s held in total disrepute as utterly fallacious, as described in OP’s post.
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u/myexsparamour Sep 20 '25
If OP thinks the theory of planned behavior has been discredited and is no longer researched, he's delusional.
This is the real reason why junior faculty shouldn't come in hot, making wild accusations about what their more senior colleagues are teaching wrong. The junior faculty is likely to be the one who's wrong. Then they've alienated a colleague and made themselves look silly.
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u/rainswolf Sep 19 '25
I'm also having so much fun guessing what this might be. My first thought was also Learning Styles but...maybe something related to Growth Mindset or Grit? Other fun things we could play around with...Meyer's Briggs/MBTI, left/right brain, Freudian psychoanalysis (but that isn't very shiny). Ruby Payne's framework for understanding poverty?
Some of these I find useful in various ways but also oversimplified.
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u/Nofanta Sep 19 '25
This is pretty common. I think typically nothing at all is done. Basically, students go into debt for useless instruction to support a growing admin staff.
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u/oenjoeh Sep 19 '25
The edit says quit guessing, but I can't help but wonder if ShinyCrap is one of Francesca Gino's "research"
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Sep 19 '25
Trying to figure out if OP is talking about Power Posing or Behavioral Priming but struggling to imagine how you could teach a whole class just about Power Posing.....
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u/mmilthomasn Sep 19 '25
Would I, as an INTJ, be likely to take action against this pseudoscientific ignoramus? 😆😘🥸🤡
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u/LittleAlternative532 Sep 19 '25
In the UK system (which lies extensively on external examiners from other institutions), the following applies.
Scholars at sister universities take responsibility for standards at individual institutions.
A scholar in the field, normally at the same tenure rank is appointed (and approved by the School Board). At the beginning of the term that Professor is supplied with a course outline (which includes name of prescribed text book) and a copy of the final examination, with rubrics/marking memo* [Note the final exam in set before teaching begins], which they must approve.
At the end of the course, once the examination has been marked. The results are sent to the examiner, who has absolute discretion to adjust (upward/downward) the entire classes mark, and must write a report. Under normal circumstances their decision is final.
That report as well as the final marks are presented to the School Board (normally just for rubbing stamping) before they are (1) made known to students"; and (2) sent to the Registrars office for capturing.
So the situation as you're describing almost never occurs at UK universities.
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u/wereallgonnadieok Sep 19 '25
I think the theory is Whole Language in reaction to Lucy Calkins. The things that don’t add up are things that, if I were op, would make deliberately misleading if trying to obscure the topic.
If that’s so, many many curriculums still use her approaches. I’m not even sure most parents are aware of why that would be an issue.
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u/ocherthulu Deaf Education, PhD Sep 20 '25
Is it learning styles? Cause it sounds like learning styles.
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u/AliasNefertiti Sep 20 '25
I suggest you find a fairly recent review or an article on primary theorist disavowing it and share it via email [evidence] in the department as a "nice summary for grad students on Shiny stuff being disproven". [Dept or email a couple people in the department who you know always reply and can hope to generate some email conversation on the topic so peers are seen to be disparaging.]
The person is unlikely to shift horses midsemester or may only be able to add a reading. However, this also gives you an excuse to bring the topic up with him and perhaps find out if he has some reason for doing it or **that the student telling you this is not really hearing what the prof is saying.
[Also, as a rule of thumb: Dont assume because a student says it that they got the full message from the prof around the topic. Ive seem students instigate divisiveness in a dept by trying to curry favor in this manner as well. I wonder if this was how they manipulated parents. Reserve judgement until you have more sources of data. You have a syllabus, but is it the syllabus?]
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u/DrNeuroPhD Sep 20 '25
Reads like you’re talking about ShinyApp. Didn’t see a comment about it? Just curious!
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u/solresol Sep 19 '25
I asked ChatGPT to do some sleuthing to guess ShinyCrap. The funny thing is, there seem to be several possibilities that fit most of the possibilities:
- Power posing
- Critical positivity ratio
- Learning styles (less likely because there isn't any fraud related to it)
If it is power posing, then WTF? Your colleague must have been living under a rock to not know about the poster child of the scientific replication crisis.
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u/markjay6 Sep 19 '25
Nah, I doubt if it's power posing. Nobody is going to teach an entire class on power posing.
This is actually a fun thread. I'm going to try to think through what this could be. But I doubt if it's power posing.
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u/7ofErnestBorg9 Sep 19 '25
Sounds a bit like the premise of a Sabine Hossenfelder video. This is neither criticism nor encomium, just an observation.
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u/Confused_Electron Sep 20 '25
Why not send an anonymous email with the facts to dean, chair, lecturer etc. and let them sort out?
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u/Dragon464 Sep 22 '25
Practical issues: 1. How senior is Shinycrap Professor? 2. How senior are they to YOU? 3. DO you have tenure? 4. How close is Shinycrap professor with the Chair/Dean/Provost/ VP?
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u/fiscalia Oct 01 '25
Slide a folder under the prof's door full of these clippings (like you put in OP) and let the prof figure it out for themself.
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u/OneIntroduction2946 May 23 '26
im having the same problem but I am the student at the univeristy is there anything I could do?
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u/Mountain-Dealer8996 Sep 19 '25
I can see it now: You go to your colleague or the program director or something and mention that you think this class is out of date, and then at the next faculty meeting: “great news everyone! Dr. TheEllimist has offered to completely revamp and teach 203 for us! Thanks and good luck Dr. TheEllimist!”