What is critical metascience and why is it important?

Metascience uses a scientific approach to understand and improve science. Critical metascience takes a step back to question metascience’s commonly-accepted assumptions, methods, problems, and solutions. In this article, I define critical metascience and explain how it can help to identify and address collective biases within metascience. I also highlight some emerging themes in the field. Finally, I consider some potential relationships between metascience and critical metascience and argue that the most functional model is one in which two fields are partially overlapping. I conclude that there needs to be greater recognition and dialogue between metascience and critical metascience in order to improve metascience’s objectivity and approach.