Isn't it possible that some people just want to make a name for themselves so bad, that they will purposefully search for an opposing or radical alternative solution? Everything is so competitive in the western world, that it wouldn't surprise me if the dynamics of problem solving are misused for a popularity contest rather than getting to the core of a real problem. I often wonder if researchers latch on to an interesting subject and inadvertently shift their focus from something of real value to simply having something important "sounding" to say...just so it appears as if they are being original and creative.
There are many pressures to perform at any level of the spotlight, and those aspiring to join the club, such as US university students, would naturally be a little more vulnerable to have their intent seeded with a burning desire to impress. Just as well, if one were to statistically calculate how many grad students were doing research in the humanities, social sciences, psychology, etc...it immediately becomes obvious that the chance for standing out in the crowd would greatly increase, were one to produce some fresh content. I just worry that the content we are being fed is lacking in substance.
Most of the research on cognitive biases and other psychological phenomena that we draw on here is based on samples of students at US universities. To what extent are we uncovering human universals, and to what extent facts about these WEIRD (Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic) sample sources? A paper in press in Behavioural and Brain Sciences the evidence from studies that reach outside this group and highlights the many instances in which US students are outliers for many crucial studies in behavioural economics.
Epiphenom: How normal is WEIRD?
Henrich, J., Heine, S. J., & Norenzayan, A. (in press). The Weirdest people in the world? (PDF) Behavioral and Brain Sciences.
Broad claims about human psychology and behavior based on narrow samples from Western societies are regularly published in leading journals. Are such species-generalizing claims justified? This review suggests not only that substantial variability in experimental results emerges across populations in basic domains, but that standard subjects are in fact rather unusual compared with the rest of the species - frequent outliers. The domains reviewed include visual perception, fairness, categorization, spatial cognition, memory, moral reasoning and self‐concepts. This review (1) indicates caution in addressing questions of human nature based on this thin slice of humanity, and (2) suggests that understanding human psychology will require tapping broader subject pools. We close by proposing ways to address these challenges.