Replication: A Critique and Overview for Kinesiology

Replication can improve the scientific rigor in kinesiology and is a welcome advancement that we applaud. However, replication is frequently viewed as the gold standard of scientific research, and failures in replication are frequently perceived as a crisis. Given that this message is often repeated with little nuance or explanation, the goal of the current paper is to provide an in-depth and nuanced perspective on replication to a kinesiology audience. After establishing the value of replication efforts, we examine the replication movement across six interdependent areas: epistemic relevance (e.g., replication is not a universal scientific norm), disciplinary differences (e.g., exercise physiology, exercise psychology, and sport sociology), confirmation versus exploration work, research quality, methodological approaches (e.g., the limited engagement of qualitative researchers with replication), and alternative methods for establishing confidence in research findings (e.g., approaches beyond replication).