The misuse of asterisks in hypothesis testing

This paper serves to demonstrate that the practise of using one, two, or three asterisks (according to a type-I-risk α either 0.05, 0.01, or 0.001) in significance testing as given particularly with regard to empirical research in psychology is in no way in accordance with the Neyman-Pearson theory of statistical hypothesis testing. Claiming a-posteriori that even a low type-I-risk α leads to significance merely discloses a researcher’s self-deception. Furthermore it will be emphasised that by using sequential sampling procedures instead of fixed sample sizes the „practice of asterisks“ would not arise. Besides this, a simulation study will show that sequential sampling procedures are not only efficient concerning a lower sample size but are also robust and nevertheless powerful in the case of non-normal distributions.