Talk:Tryon's Rat Experiment

Citations list useful for updating this article and related articles
You may find it helpful while reading or editing articles to look at a bibliography of Biology and Genetics Citations, posted for the use of all Wikipedians who have occasion to edit articles on human genetics and related issues. I happen to have circulating access to a huge academic research library system at a university with an active research program in these issues (and to other academic libraries in the same large metropolitan area) and have been researching these issues sporadically since 1989. You are welcome to use these citations for your own research. You can help other Wikipedians by suggesting new sources through comments on that page. It will be extremely helpful for articles on human genetics to edit them according to the Wikipedia standards for reliable sources for medicine-related articles, as it is important to get these issues as well verified as possible. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk, how I edit) 20:18, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

Useful reference
The following would be very helpful to anyone contributing to this page:

Rosenthal
The Rosenthal section dumped in by an anon (from New Haven, possibly a Yale student judging from their other contribs) needs to be cleaned up. It could not have been an error in Tryon's rats because the maze running process was fully automated, and Tryon's rats bred true and the line used elsewhere by people completely uninvolved in the original experiment. (One could adduce additional problems - the Rosenthal experiment has a tiny sample size, most of Rosenthal's stuff like the 'Pygmalion effect' doesn't replicate, and so on - but that's the main problem.) It's puzzling that it's given so much space when it appears to be incorrect, or at least misleadingly described, making it possibly a WP:UNDUE problem; does any textbook or other secondary source put so much weight on this? The Wahlsten review of animal breeding experiments doesn't even mention it. --Gwern (contribs) 19:01, 16 July 2019 (UTC)
 * It's currently all unsourced. But it is clearly written, if a bit on the long side. Martinevans123 (talk) 20:35, 16 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Being clearly written is not what I was asking about. --Gwern (contribs) 00:15, 25 July 2019 (UTC)

When and where?
It's not ideal to have and  tags at the end of the first sentence. I don't know why this cite is considered "not reliable and should not be cited on Wikipedia" in this case, but I chose that re-printed article from February 1992's American Psychologist, by Nancy K. Innis of University of Western Ontario, somewhat at random, just to cite this study:
 * Tryon, R. C. (1940). Genetic differences in maze-learning ability in rats. Yearbook of the National Society for Studies in Education, 39, 111-119.

Was this the base study by Tryon? Or is there a more appropriate paper to cite? Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 09:22, 29 December 2019 (UTC)

Excessive further reading links
Regarding this edit, this listing is indiscriminate and arbitrary, and appears to be selected by the person who is hosting this material on a personal website. At most one or two links could be included for convenience, per WP:NOTDIRECTORY and WP:NOTWEBHOST. Otherwise, this will need specific context from a reliable, independent source. Merely dumping a large quantity of WP:PRIMARY sources from different authors spanning decades is not appropriate. Grayfell (talk) 02:10, 31 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Why does a hosting by a "personal website" matter. These are all direct links to pdfs? Is there a copyright issue? Cooper & Zubek (1958) is already used as a reference in the article anyway, so I don't see why that one is "indiscriminate and arbitrary". It's useful to be able to read it. But I agree they fall foul of WP:PRIMARY and are not used to explain anything. Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 00:30, 3 January 2020 (UTC)


 * Per WP:ELMAYBE, long lists of links are do be avoided. A directory would be preferable. It is not enough to "infodump" some information, which was selected without any explanation at all, and expect readers figure it out for themselves. The list didn't even mention where these things were published. As a rhetorical example, why is "Stone & Nyswander 1927" given exactly as much attention as "McClearn 1970"? Where should readers start, at the first, or at the last? At the oldest, or at the newest? The purpose of an encyclopedia is, in part, to organize information, but this isn't organized in any useful way. As it was, this was just a list of PDFs. This is demonstrated by your question about which study was the main study... This list includes several studies spanning decades with multiple different authors, so it doesn't really answer any questions. A list of WP:PRIMARY sources can be very helpful, but we would need some context. Ideally, this would be from a reliable source. Grayfell (talk) 00:58, 3 January 2020 (UTC)


 * By your own account, you did not come here because you care about an obscure page has too many external links (I agree it is somewhat excessive). Considering that the article is already quite short, and should be expanded, I suggest you spend your efforts expanding the page, so that the number of external links is not so excessive. Many of them could usefully be used as sources in the article for historical background. AndewNguyen (talk) 04:36, 5 January 2020 (UTC)


 * Clearly you do not understand what I am saying. Nowhere did I say why I came here, and it is inappropriate to imply otherwise. Further, this wouldn't be a valid excuse for edit warring. If you agree that it's excessive, why are you arguing for inclusion based on wikilawyering about stability? The purpose of editing is to improve the article, not to preserve confusing content merely because it was already added. You agree that there are too many links, so we agree that this is an improvement. If you want to summarize reliable, independent sources, do so, but do not get in the way of other people's efforts to improve the project. Grayfell (talk) 21:59, 6 January 2020 (UTC)


 * Why do you see a list of papers on this subject as "confusing"? They all seem to be wholly connected with this subject. Martinevans123 (talk) 22:05, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * As I already explained, it is a disorganized dump of "seemingly" connected papers, and I'm not sure they are all "wholly" connected. We need WP:SECONDARY sources to explain how these are connected, and lacking that it would be better to link to an index page or similar. Grayfell (talk) 22:13, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Yes, they're pretty seeming to me. What sort of "index page" did you have in mind? Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 22:25, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * They seem that way to you, but that's WP:OR. A little bit of OR is excusable in an EL section, but this is not a little bit, it's a lot. Why is Gerald E. McClearn's 1970 review of behavior genetics specifically relevant to this article, instead of behavioral genetics? I am not asking you to explain to me, I am asking how readers are going to know why this is useful? This list is an arbitrary selection if readers are simply expected to take our word for it that all of these are useful.
 * By index page, I mean a site (a single webpage or similar) which either provides at least some bare minimum of context, or at least indicates who has decided to include these papers and not others. Grayfell (talk) 22:44, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * A great idea. Would love to see one. Martinevans123 (talk) 22:46, 6 January 2020 (UTC) p.s. well he does explain that "McGaugh et al. (1962) used descendants of Tryon's maze bright and maze dull strains of rat in explorations of the memory mechanism." But yes, that's just one sentence in a rather long review paoer. But glad I'm not trying to explain that to you.

Unreliable external host
Regarding this edit, there are multiple problems with linking to this site. It is a WP:SPS, the blog's author is not a credible expert in any relevant topic, the blog's author has been blocked from editing Wikipedia (by Arbcom no less), and the blog's author has a documented reputation for "academically dodgy" work, per OpenPsych. There are other problems here, as well, but that's enough. Including this link as a convenience would introduce far more problems than it solves. Using it as a reliable source is even less appropriate. Grayfell (talk) 02:17, 31 December 2019 (UTC)
 * What are the other problems exactly? As I suggested above, it seems to be simply a pdf reprint of an article by Nancy K. Innis from February 1992's American Psychologist. There is no blog or "academically dodgy" content. Does that mean there is a copyright issue? I would very much appreciate an answer the question in "When and where?" above. The original paper itself could then be cited. Many thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 08:54, 31 December 2019 (UTC)


 * If you have read the paper itself and think it's useful, by all means summarize it. Please link via PubMed, or via PyschNet, or via the DOI template: or by some other reputable host if you know of one. Free and convenient is always nice, but using what we hope is an unmodified PDF from a WP:FRINGE researcher with an ax to grind against Wikipedia is letting FUTON overrule common sense.
 * Another related issue is the age and relative obscurity of the source. If this were the only source we have explaining this information, I would think this article had a more serious notability issue. There are other sources of course, but the Innis article is merely one of many, and should not be over-stated. I say this is a related issue because the blocked editor had a history of removing sources from Wikipedia for spurious or ideological reasons. The sources he has made available on his personal website are ones which directly or indirectly support fringe views, and are not a good representation of the relevant literature as a whole. He is free to do whatever he wants with his websites, so on the surface, this is irrelevant. However, if this is intentionally curated on ideological grounds, or is merely careless, this becomes cherry-picking-by-proxy. Ignoring this would be doing a disservice to both Wikipedia, and to the author of the original paper.
 * We can, and should, look at the larger picture here. This is yet another reason we should be very careful when relying on private websites which are hosting obscure primary sources. Curation of sources is important. Grayfell (talk) 00:07, 1 January 2020 (UTC)
 * If Nancy K. Innis had an axe to grind, please tell us what it is. What was Tryon's original paper? Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 00:20, 1 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Seriously? Either you misunderstood me, or you are playing games. As I said, if you have read the paper itself from a reputable outlet, and you believe it's a reliable source, go ahead and cite it. If you do so, please use a different URL. The editor who hosts the article on his personal website has an axe to grind, not Innis. As I said, we should not ignore this context and cite a random URL merely because it is convenient. Grayfell (talk) 02:33, 1 January 2020 (UTC)
 * It seems I have misunderstood you. Have you read the "When and where?" section above? Please reply there. Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 09:03, 1 January 2020 (UTC)
 * WP:SPS does not apply, this is just hosted by a 3rd party blog, not published by it. Your dislike and arguments against the author of that site are irrelevant. I have restored the stable version again. Please do not remove major portions of content when the edit is disputed. AndewNguyen (talk) 18:30, 2 January 2020 (UTC)
 * AndewNguyen, you have added links to 11 papers by Tryon, dated between 1930 and 1940. Is there any one of these that might be better regarded as "the central paper", or is the 1940 Yearbook of the National Society for Studies in Education, used in the lead section, still the most appropriate? Many thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 18:38, 2 January 2020 (UTC) p.s. I only added that Nancy K. Innis article as it was a secondary source and was available online.
 * I did not add them, User:Gwern did. I restored the stable version before mass deletion. I agree linking so many papers is somewhat excessive and welcome discussion on which to keep. Generally speaking, since the topic of the article is Tryon's work on rats, then linking to his original papers on the topic seems a good idea. Then perhaps a few important secondary sources. AndewNguyen (talk) 18:49, 2 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Ok, sorry for the misunderstanding. I'm really not getting very far with this question. The article originally had and  tags. Looking at that list of papers, it looks like "in 1940" may be misleading, unless one of the papers that was published in that year drew conclusions from all the work he had done in the previous 10 years? The article also says: "Prior to Robert Tryon’s study of selective rat breeding, concluded in 1942 ..."., so was there a paper in 1942 that summed it all up? Martinevans123 (talk) 19:30, 2 January 2020 (UTC)

For clarity, I started this talk page section specifically to discuss the use of the personal website of Emil Kirkegaard (who is site-banned from Wikipedia) for "convenience links". I believe this would be a bad idea for several reasons, but if this is still contentious, we can find an appropriate noticeboard. Martinevans123 has already started a section above for discussion the paper itself. I started above to discuss the large quantity of WP:NOTDIRECTORY links, since I think this is a separate issue which will need more nuanced discussion. We can discuss whatever we want wherever we need to, but likewise, don't be surprised if people decline to comment on something in the place you expect them to. Grayfell (talk) 22:20, 2 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Feel free to answer my question wherever you choose. I still fail to see why a pdf reprint of that article by Nancy K. Innis is contentious, or has anything to do with Emil Kirkegaard. Martinevans123 (talk) 22:28, 2 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Why did you re-add the link? I am sincerely confused by this edit. I mentioned three alternative ways to cite this paper which do not rely on this website. The source is an article published in 1992, it is not merely a PDF file on an unreliable server. The Innis article is not contentious. The use of this website as a host is contentious. This has to do with Emil Kirkegaard, because it is his personal website. Are you contesting this? We do not ignore context and just throw whatever link we happen to find at an article. Just as we do not use copyvio youtube links merely because they are convenient, we should not use this website. If you have read the source, cite the source via a reliable outlet. This specific link is not necessary to do this. Grayfell (talk) 23:57, 2 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Ah yes, an unreliable server. That's enough to confuse anyone. Did I mention I had a bigger question? Martinevans123 (talk) 00:04, 3 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Yes, you mentioned it many times, but do not seem to understand why nobody is answering you... Again, I am not interested in playing games, and that's what this appears to be. The link doesn't belong whether or not you get your questions answered. If you really don't get why linking to this website is a problem, just cite the DOI number and you won't have to worry about it. If you cannot, or don't want to, take responsibility for this source, then find a better source. Grayfell (talk) 00:17, 3 January 2020 (UTC)
 * I certainly don't understand why "nobody is answering me". You think Kirkegaard's "unreliable server" has somehow corrupted the order of the words in the pdf of that article by Innis, so the meaning's all changed? The use of that site is not really the main issue here. Martinevans123 (talk) 00:23, 3 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Do not put words in my mouth. Is the site the main issue here in the article? No, I agree, it certainly is not. Is it the main issue in this section, which I started specifically to explain the issue? Yes, it is the main issue here. Your questions are good ones, but this specific issue cannot address them. I never said that Kirkegaard's server corrupted the words. I said that linking to the study via a reliable website would be preferable for multiple reasons. Grayfell (talk) 00:36, 3 January 2020 (UTC)
 * I'm sure they wouldn't fit. You've sure got it in for poor Emil and his unreliable server, haven't you. I wonder how unreliable it really is. But why not move on to the more substantive question? Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 00:42, 3 January 2020 (UTC)
 * I don't know what the point is of going around Wikipedia to for external links to remove because one does not like the person who owns a website that hosts 3rd party copies of material we are liking to. This does not sound like behavior that is in line with any Wikipedia policy I know of. I suggest that Grayfell focus on issues that matter instead of this vendetta-like behavior. AndewNguyen (talk) 04:33, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
 * If you do not know the point, perhaps you should restrain yourself from making such loaded assumptions. My opinion about this person has nothing to do with the fact that they have been banned from Wikipedia, and have a documented history of academic misconduct. We do not ignore these kinds of things just because it is convenient. Would an outside observer view your own edits as "vendetta-like"? I am inclined to think they could easily say the same. Perhaps instead of looking for vendettas behind edits you don't know the point of, you should focus on reliable sources and reputable outlets. Grayfell (talk) 22:03, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

I've removed the link for a second time, although the 1992 Nancy K. Innis article itself looks quite relevant as a secondary source. I suggest we focus discussion on article content. Martinevans123 (talk) 22:09, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * I object on general principle to the policing of 3rd party hosts of material based on some editor's dislike of the owner of the host. Nevertheless, in the spirit of collaboration on improving the article, let's move on from that matter. AndewNguyen (talk) 10:49, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

Title
Why is the title "Tryon's Rat Experiment" in the singular? Surely, as with most notable psychological studies, it was a whole series of experiments, performed by Tryon, over at least 10 years? Or if not, could someone please tell us which one was really the experiment? Many thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 00:19, 3 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Good point. I agree with a change to plural. --AndewNguyen (talk) 04:28, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
 * So, any objections from anyone? Martinevans123 (talk) 22:06, 6 January 2020 (UTC)