Download
1 / 109
1.09k likes | 1.25k Vues
Bad Journalism. Midterm exam. Question from Last Year’s Final. In 1995, the terrorist group Aum Shinrikyo released deadly sarin nerve-gas in the subways of Tokyo. 13 people died, 50 were injured, and thousands of others suffered health problems. Question from Last Year’s Final.
E N D
Question from Last Year’s Final In 1995, the terrorist group AumShinrikyo released deadly sarin nerve-gas in the subways of Tokyo. 13 people died, 50 were injured, and thousands of others suffered health problems.
Question from Last Year’s Final While many people suffered real symptoms caused by sarin, hospitals were flooded with patients suffering from the highly publicized potential symptoms, like nausea and dizziness, who had not, it turned out, been exposed to the sarin.
Question from Last Year’s Final Based on the information that we learned in class, what is the most likely explanation of why people who had not been exposed to the deadly nerve gas still felt the symptoms of it?
Possible Answer People’s beliefs affect how they feel. Even if you have not been exposed to nerve gas, if you believe you have been exposed, then you are more likely to feel negative symptoms.
Optional Things to Say • This is like the example of MSG that we talked about in class. People experience negative symptoms when they believe they are allergic to MSG, even though MSG is harmless. • This is called the “nocebo effect.” • This is similar to the placebo effect, where people experience positive effects after being given inactive treatments they believe will make them better.
Midterm Exam • 10 questions total • 10 marks each • Closed note exam • No electronic devices allowed
Stress and Headaches “In the study, researchers followed more than 5,000 participants in Germany for two years and found that the greater the stress in a person's life, the more intense and frequent their headaches were.”
Stress and Headaches “Participants were contacted four times yearly and were asked how many headaches they'd had in the previous three months. They also rated their stress level on a scale of zero to 100, following a well-established protocol for stress measurement.”
A causes B? The researchers’ explanation was: “The study results imply that, while headache medicine can help mitigate the pain, reducing stress can prevent headaches from even happening, the researchers said.” This is only true if stress causes headaches.
B causes A? It’s possible that headaches cause stress, and that that is the source of the correlation between stress and headaches. For example, headaches distract you, and make it difficult to concentrate and work. Falling behind in your work can make you stressed out, and worried about your job.
Notice the Difference! If headaches cause stress, the lowering your stress level will not solve your headache problem. Then this would be BAD advice:
BAD Advice “Chronic headache sufferers might consider reaching for the yoga mat before they go for the aspirin. The variety of stress-relieving activities likely outnumbers the types of painkillers on the pharmacy shelves.”
GOOD Advice If headaches cause stress, then taking pain medication might be a good way to make your stress go away!
Common Cause Explanation There are also possible common cause explanations: for example: difficult jobs. Headaches ↑ Difficult job with long hours ↓ Stress
Common Cause The brain uses more energy than any other human organ: 20% of our total calories burned are burned by the brain!
Common Cause If we use our brain too much, for example, if we have difficult jobs with long hours, the extra effort might cause our heads to hurt.
Common Cause Additionally, a difficult job with long hours may have emotional effects: it may cause us to be stressed out.
Notice the Difference! If difficult jobs with long hours are responsible for both stress and headaches, then none of the previous advice will be any good: Reducing stress will not reduce headaches and reducing headaches will not reduce stress.
GOOD Advice Of course, if we can’t quit our jobs, we might have to treat the symptoms and not the causes!
GOOD Advice
Bad Journalism Newspapers love news stories that blame new technology. Old people love newspapers, but they hate new things they don’t understand. https://xkcd.com/1227/
Problem #2 “Students who spend a lot of time on Facebook are more likely to develop an eating disorder, new research has revealed.”
Problem #2 “Female students who spend a lot of time on the social networking site tend to be more body conscious and to suffer from more anxiety.”
Problem #2 “They also tend to give greater significance to the number of comments and ‘likes’ on their pictures and status updates. They are more likely to ‘untag’ themselves in pictures.”
Study Design “A study published in the International Journal of Eating Disorders saw researchers study 960 female college students. These women were evaluated on the time they spent on Facebook, how important they considered ‘likes’ to be and whether or not they ‘untagged’ photos of themselves.”
A causes B? ‘In examining the immediate consequences of Facebook use, we found that 20 minutes of Facebook use contributed to maintenance of higher weight and shape concerns and anxiety compared to a control internet condition. This causal link is important because anxiety and body image concerns both increase risk for developing eating disorders,’ Dr Keel stated.Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook
B causes A? How about a different possibility. Imagine you don’t like how you look. What could that cause you to do? Untag yourself in pictures and get upset if no one likes your posts.
Common Cause Age? Wealth? Intelligence? There are lots of common cause possibilities here. • Young people more self-conscious and internet savvy. • Poor people care more about money than looks and can’t afford the internet as much. • Smart people care about politics more than looks and read books instead of reading fb.
Problem #3 ‘The survey polled around 10,000 respondents, and found that around 90 percent of them were “satisfied” or “very satisfied” with their sex lives.’
Problem #3 ‘But here’s where the data gets interesting. The study also examined sexual satisfaction against financial status. Across the board, people who had more money, reported more sexual satisfaction.’
A causes B? ‘Ruiz linked the lack of sexual satisfaction to increased incidences of sexual abuse. “It’s particularly women of a lower socioeconomic status who suffer more experiences of sexual abuse. It’s important to bear in mind that these women also might have more problems when it comes to contacting the various organizations that can provide help for them,” she said.’
A causes B? The theory outlined in the article is probably true. Poor women are more likely to be sexually abused, and to be forced to stay in bad relationships for financial reasons. Poverty Abuse Bad sex life
Many Causes of Correlations But it is also possible that there are other causal factors that increase the correlation in addition to the true ones identified in the article. ALL of these can be true: • A causes B • B causes A • A common cause causes both A and B • A and B are sometimes accidentally correlated
Additional Common Cause Wealth Less Abuse More sex satisfaction Health
The Fourth Estate The press is often called “the fourth estate”– a political power different from the three branches of government (executive, legislative, and judiciary) that keeps them in check. A healthy press is an adversarial press.
The Necessary Press In addition, media– once newspapers, but now mostly televised news and internet news– is the principle source of information people have about world events, scientific developments, health, and politics. Even if you get your news from friends on facebook– someone has to get it from the news media.
Afflicting the Comfortable The press is supposed to “comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.” Unfortunately, the news can be horribly misleading, full of discredited falsehoods and propaganda. It can comfort the comfortable and afflict the afflicted.
Newspaper Organization A newspaper contains: • News reports • Editorials • Advertisements
