Marc Hauser, the once-lauded animal cognition expert, has resigned his position
as professor of psychology at Harvard University. His decision follows a year's leave imposed on him after he was found guilty last autumn of scientific misconduct. That charge led to one of his papers being retracted, one corrected and one queried, due to missing data. A replication by Hauser and his colleague Justin Wood of that last paper was published earlier this year (tinyurl.com/5ul8b4r), but confusion remains over which findings from Hauser's lab can be trusted and which are suspect. This is especially the case since Hauser was renowned for demonstrating in monkeys cognitive abilities previously considered by others to be unique to great apes.

-- Christian Jarrett

Edited: 08/09/2011 at 12:10 PM by jonsut