What are common types of fallacies in research?

Logical fallacies that are common in research include the following:

  • Hasty generalization: Drawing broad and general conclusions from a small or unrepresentative sample of data
  • Fallacy of composition: Assuming that what is true of the parts must be true of the whole
  • Post hoc fallacy: Inferring that simply because one event followed another, the first event must have caused the second event
  • Ecological fallacy: Forming conclusions about individuals based on group-level data
  • False cause fallacy: Inferring a cause-and-effect relationship between two variables when none exists