A dis-proven hypothesis and why it's not the end of the world

There are two types of people in the world:

Those who can extrapolate from incomplete pieces of information.

…

So the more data I’m collecting for my project, the more ‘wrong’ my hypothesis is looking.
And when I say ‘wrong,’ I mean ‘we were completely on the wrong path with that one!’

So far, the majority of my participants aren’t responding the way I anticipated, which is leading me to conclude that perhaps my study was looking at the wrong element this whole time.

But is it the end of the world for my project? Of course not!

The huge benefit of exploratory qualitative research is that there’s plenty of wiggle room to still ‘find’ things that are important even if you were looking at the wrong thing. As a result, since my hypothesis was disproven, I can now definitively say, ‘It’s NOT this, it’s THIS!’

My data is leading me toward a result which is quite clear-cut despite the fact that I didn’t set out to find that result. It just happened to be there. I was surprised by the finding, but there it is.

I was wrong, and in the process of being wrong, I found The “Right Thing” Instead.

Now, for my professors and those of you who will proceed to look at me with judgement and condescension about my ‘wrong’ hypothesis, I’ve got something to say to you:

From the beginning, I was led and informed by stakeholders. I built my hypothesis on information given to me by people experiencing the phenomena I wanted to study. I used their language, their terminology, and looked at the academic literature. At the beginning of my project, everything looked consistent and handy-dandy. I followed academic rigor and developed a project that was watertight. It stood up to scrutiny, it was beta-tested, stamped off by TWO ethics committees, and looked over by the health system’s CO. And everyone. I repeat, EVERYONE I am working with, was convinced I’d find information on my hypothesis. My professors, the stakeholders, the wider community, and the academic community, were all walking down the path of my hypothesis.

And then I started collecting the data.

Turns out, the hypothesis was wrong. The literature, in some aspects of academic writing, is wrong. The stakeholders made an incorrect conclusion BECAUSE they didn’t have the data that I have. I have found the truth. My exploratory data collection explored, and has found something incredibly useful instead.

It would be intellectually dishonest of me to edit my thesis title and hypothesis, after the fact, to make it look like I was right all along. That negates the importance of the community’s input, and the consequences of this finding.

No, I’m going to be honest and declare that the path I was on from the start was incorrect, and that we can course-adjust to make sure that future work is on the right track from here on. We have an opportunity to get it right.

Because, after all, I’ve found that we were wrong.

Madeleine Kendrick (@MIKendrick94) is a PhD candidate (Scholarship Recipient, Full-time), an Academic Research Assistant, and a Business Consultant. This story was published on January 28, 2019, on Madeleine’s blog, Research & Beyond (available here), and has been republished here with her permission.