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J Archaeol Method Theory (2017) 24:424450 DOI 10.1007/s10816-015-9272-9
http://orcid.org/0000-0001-7879-4531
Web End = Published online: 7 January 2016# Springer Science+Business Media New York 2016
Abstract The use of computers and complex software is pervasive in archaeology, yet their role in the analytical pipeline is rarely exposed for other researchers to inspect or reuse. This limits the progress of archaeology because researchers cannot easily reproduce each others work to verify or extend it. Four general principles of reproducible research that have emerged in other fields are presented. An archaeological case study is described that shows how each principle can be implemented using freely available software. The costs and benefits of implementing reproducible research are assessed. The primary benefit, of sharing data in particular, is increased impact via an increased number of citations. The primary cost is the additional time required to enhance reproducibility, although the exact amount is difficult to quantify.
Keywords Reproducible research . Computer programming . Software engineering . Australian archaeology. Open science
Introduction
Archaeology, like all scientific fields, advances through rigorous tests of previously published studies. When numerous investigations are performed by different researchers and demonstrate similar results, we hold these results to be a reasonable approximation of a true account of past human behavior. This ability to reproduce the results of other researchers is a core tenet of scientific method, and when reproductions are successful, our field advances. In archaeology, we have a long tradition of empirical tests of reproducibility, for example, by returning to field sites excavated or surveyed by
* Ben Marwick [email protected]
1 Department of Anthropology, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA
2 Center for Archaeological Science, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, Australia
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Web End = Computational Reproducibility in Archaeological Research: Basic Principles and a Case Studyof Their Implementation
Ben Marwick1,2
Computational Reproducibility in Archaeological Research 425
earlier generations of archaeologists, and re-examining museum collections with new methods.
However, we, like many disciplines, have made little progress in testing the reproducibility of statistical and computational results, or even facilitating or enabling these tests (Ince et al. 2012; Peng 2011). The typical contemporary journal article describing the results of an archaeological study rarely contains enough information for another archaeologist to reproduce its statistical results and figures. Raw...