This is a flawed logical argument. Imagine this article from 1830:
"If you think phrenology is bad, imagine how bad it was in 1810".
Rinse & repeat for the appropriate time frames for alchemy, astrology, or any other field that tried to misapply science. Just because a field is studied for a long time or tries to apply the scientific method doesn't lend credence to the approach. All it means is, at best, we've managed to toss some things that are now obviously wrong/flaws. In 20 years we'll be doing the same to things we "know" today OR the flaws will remain because we don't have the math/science to demonstrate the flaws more obviously & there's social pressure to keep "building" (even if the foundation is flawed). However, as we should all be aware, false knowledge grows exponentially more quickly than our true understanding of the universe because our imagination is limitless.
The general premise with these studies is that if an effect size is real, then a preliminary study would show something interesting. To my knowledge, statistically that is a nonsense argument. Small sample sizes suffer from various small sample effects to the point that you can't predict either way (otherwise there wouldn't be a point in doing a larger study). To add insult to injury, all of these kinds of studies are only on local college students, which further invalidates any potential information gleamed from a preliminary study.
TLDR: The way science is done in the social sciences is fundamentally flawed & the fact that limited funding ensures that's the case doesn't excuse that a significant enough part of the body of knowledge isn't reliable.
"If you think phrenology is bad, imagine how bad it was in 1810".
Rinse & repeat for the appropriate time frames for alchemy, astrology, or any other field that tried to misapply science. Just because a field is studied for a long time or tries to apply the scientific method doesn't lend credence to the approach. All it means is, at best, we've managed to toss some things that are now obviously wrong/flaws. In 20 years we'll be doing the same to things we "know" today OR the flaws will remain because we don't have the math/science to demonstrate the flaws more obviously & there's social pressure to keep "building" (even if the foundation is flawed). However, as we should all be aware, false knowledge grows exponentially more quickly than our true understanding of the universe because our imagination is limitless.