Aug. 7, 2026

As a social scientist, I am hardwired to believe that when evidence underlying a hypothesis or conclusion changes, it is critical that the record be updated to reflect those changes – both as a means of preserving integrity and facilitating the pursuit of truth.

Recently, I was made aware that data underlying a 2002 paper about deadlines and procrastination that I co-authored contained serious anomalies.

The documentary record I have at my disposal today about those experiments isn’t sufficient to answer the questions that have been raised, and more than two decades, and hundreds of experiments later, my memory is similarly insufficient.

Moving forward, my responsibility lies in ensuring accuracy – in updating the record on these experiments and, along with my co-author, cooperating with the journal that first published our paper to support their reviews and retraction processes.

Irrationally yours,
Dan Ariely