The science of psychology is in crisis. One by one, many of its flashiest and most famous results have collapsed in the last decade as a new generation of researchers have re-examined famous findings.

Fame struck Adam Nyerere Bahner like a random bolt of lightning. At the time, Bahner was a graduate student living in Minneapolis, pursuing a Ph.D. in American studies. "I was a bad graduate student.

If you were being attacked, would anyone stop to help you? A famous result in psychology known as the bystander effect says probably not, but now a review of real-life violent situations says this ...