The Internet loves the Rat Park experiment, but it never replicated and should be considered just as bogus as all the other stuff in social psych which hasn't survived the replication crisis.
It's fitting for this thread though, because it survives for the exact reason the alpha wolf stuff survives: people love the story so they hang on to it irrespective of the science.
Can you elaborate more on this? I did not take psychology in high school, but I would imagine that such a course would focus on fundamental concepts where “replicating” wouldn’t even be an issue. There might be teachers who might bring up the pop-sci topics, but wouldn’t the meat of the class just be learning about theories or frameworks?
> it never replicated and should be considered just as bogus
Did someone try to replicate it? What were the results? What were their conclusions about its credibility?
> all the other stuff in social psych which hasn't survived the replication crisis.
Replication isn't black and white: Most of the experiments - at least in the early widely reported phase - did replicate but with less statistically strong results.
Right, and we've seen plenty of people who lead the "Rat Park" equivalent of human lives and yet still get addicted to opioids. There's clearly no single cause.
It's fitting for this thread though, because it survives for the exact reason the alpha wolf stuff survives: people love the story so they hang on to it irrespective of the science.