Final answer:
Open data can protect against questionable research practices like p-hacking by ensuring transparency and enabling other researchers to replicate analyses.
Step-by-step explanation:
Open data is a practice that can protect against several questionable research practices, one of which is p-hacking. P-hacking refers to the practice of analyzing data in many different ways or collecting more data until nonsignificant results become significant, often at the conventional p-value of less than 0.05. By making data openly available, researchers enable others to reproduce their analyses or conduct new analyses, making the process more transparent and accountable. This reduces the opportunity for concealed methodological tweaking that might be used to achieve desired results, which is not an ethical way to conduct research.
Additionally, open data can help address the file drawer problem, where studies with null results are less likely to be published, by providing a platform where all data and outcomes can be shared, regardless of the results. This enables a more complete and balanced scientific record. Furthermore, it can assist in preventing under reporting null effects and discourage the practice of HARKing (hypothesizing after the results are known), which are both examples of practices that can mislead or misrepresent research findings.