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Reading the ACTUAL Studies
Replies
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fatfudgery wrote: »Christine_72 wrote: »
If the study results agree with your preconceived ideas, you trust it. If they don't, it's clearly an issue of scientific corruption and the study is garbage. And you know this without even reading the study in question because doing so reminds you of *gag* school, where, you know, actual inquiry and learning take place.
Yeah, I see no problem here.
No not at all. Whether I agree with a study doesn't automatically mean I'll blindly follow and believe it. Makes no difference to me whether it agrees or disagrees with my beliefs.
People often cite studies proving their opinion, which is often quickly counteracted with another study disproving the first, and on and on it goes on the pointless merry go round..
Which reminds me of this gif..
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I'm not a GIF lover, but this one is so appropriate for so many 10+ page threads here
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I am probably more bothered than I should be about these repeated and in my opinion, ridiculous studies that end up becoming social media posts blasting the dangers of artificial sweeteners and other food additives. I get that most people are actually sheeple and will believe anything they see in writing and that it's useless arguing with sheeple. However, I would like the opportunity to read the studies for myself and judge the methodologies and outcome based on my own knowledge of research methods. I'd also like to be able to read the peer reviews of such studies. The question is, WHERE do I look to find the actual studies (in full, not just the abstracts)? If anyone can give me some direction, I'd appreciate it.
Google Scholar.
Some of the articles/research is premium, meaning you have to pay for the article, but most of it is free. ALL are peer-reviewed. Here are a few that I've found:
https://annonc.oxfordjournals.org/content/15/10/1460.full
http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/76/4/721.long
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1955852/pdf/canmedaj01522-0027.pdf
**http://genie.weizmann.ac.il/pubs/2014_nature.pdf** this one is fascinating, btw.0 -
Christine_72 wrote: »fatfudgery wrote: »Christine_72 wrote: »
If the study results agree with your preconceived ideas, you trust it. If they don't, it's clearly an issue of scientific corruption and the study is garbage. And you know this without even reading the study in question because doing so reminds you of *gag* school, where, you know, actual inquiry and learning take place.
Yeah, I see no problem here.
No not at all. Whether I agree with a study doesn't automatically mean I'll blindly follow and believe it. Makes no difference to me whether it agrees or disagrees with my beliefs.
People often cite studies proving their opinion, which is often quickly counteracted with another study disproving the first, and on and on it goes on the pointless merry go round..
Which reminds me of this gif..
Well now I know what studies being discussed, evaluated, and critiqued looks like to one who doesn't know how to read them without unlearning how to read them.
Being able to read studies, I tend to see some people consistently post studies that back up their claim and what they know (not opinion), and use it to counter people who have hastily typed in a search in pubmed, or even funnier, Google to back up their opinion. The fun part is when the people who are backing an opinion link things based on a quick search that actually contradicts their position. There's a few examples in this this forum.0 -
stevencloser wrote: »Christine_72 wrote: »Christine_72 wrote: »I can't say I've ever read a study that's been posted here :blushing: , my eyes just glaze over and reminds of my school day's. I just go by common sense and my own personal experience.
Same here. If I don't have time to read the paper, I'll just read the abstract. But a good rule of thumb to me is just to find out who funded the study. Like that one I read last year I think that Diet Coke is healthier than water. Funded by - you guessed it - Cola Cola.
Actually that is not the way to understand studies. Funding and conflict of interest should be transparent, and it raises wariness for looking at study design, but it doesn't invalidate results.
Hehe I knew you'd be the first to jump on that one
Let me be the second then.
There's preciously few people who f***ed up their reputation by lying enough to be completely disregarded from the getgo. Mercola, Oz, etc.
As someone who has had to have research validated and approved, I know that the IRB controlling the studies, along with the FDA or government regulating body, watch the results very carefully, regardless of the funding (the IRB watches much more closely than the government regulators, when government regulators are required.)0 -
Christine_72 wrote: »stevencloser wrote: »Christine_72 wrote: »Christine_72 wrote: »I can't say I've ever read a study that's been posted here :blushing: , my eyes just glaze over and reminds of my school day's. I just go by common sense and my own personal experience.
Same here. If I don't have time to read the paper, I'll just read the abstract. But a good rule of thumb to me is just to find out who funded the study. Like that one I read last year I think that Diet Coke is healthier than water. Funded by - you guessed it - Cola Cola.
Actually that is not the way to understand studies. Funding and conflict of interest should be transparent, and it raises wariness for looking at study design, but it doesn't invalidate results.
Hehe I knew you'd be the first to jump on that one
Let me be the second then.
There's preciously few people who f***ed up their reputation by lying enough to be completely disregarded from the getgo. Mercola, Oz, etc.
I'll jump on that as well. Research is expensive and so a lot of times it'll only get done if someone is willing to pay for it.
Especially if the result will show the "funder" in a favourable light..
My gut instinct has never steered me wrong.
If your gut instinct is to never read a scholarly medical research paper that's been linked on here, you're being steered wrong. There's something to be said for educating yourself and learning everything you can about your own health and well-being. It's important to learn consistently throughout life; and we aren't learning anything from sponsored sources like television spokepersons. Trusting scientific studies is going to be the best bet; that's why people above have recommended sites like PubMed or university libraries.
^^This. "Common sense" brought us the Inquisition, slavery and obesity. Education fights those "common sense" ideas.0 -
There are a number of issues at play that make all of those crazy social media reports. One large issue I constantly see is just plain bad reporting by science journalists. Often times it is very evident that the person does not understand the subject matter and didn't consult professionals in the field to help them understand so they can report on it, or they just didn't even read the study. This is why. I always try to tell people to do what it seems most people in this thread dk, and go read the study.
With reading the study on their own, though, you then run into problems with the person's own ability to interpret the study reliably. While some of tr he speak may be plain enough to understand what the words mean, I think it often takes a more trained eye to comprehend the details and pick out any *kitten* in the study itself. I often find myself having to rely on field experts to speak on the study before I can confidently say I feel I know what the study is really saying.
On top of those issues , there are also issues with even the press releases doing a bad job talking about the study. I try to read the studis when I can, but I also still keep a couple good science reporters in my regular reading that I can trust will know the subject or speak with the experts to ensure good reporting.0 -
tl;dr0
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TheCrawlingChaos wrote: »There are a number of issues at play that make all of those crazy social media reports. One large issue I constantly see is just plain bad reporting by science journalists. Often times it is very evident that the person does not understand the subject matter and didn't consult professionals in the field to help them understand so they can report on it, or they just didn't even read the study. This is why. I always try to tell people to do what it seems most people in this thread dk, and go read the study.
With reading the study on their own, though, you then run into problems with the person's own ability to interpret the study reliably. While some of tr he speak may be plain enough to understand what the words mean, I think it often takes a more trained eye to comprehend the details and pick out any *kitten* in the study itself. I often find myself having to rely on field experts to speak on the study before I can confidently say I feel I know what the study is really saying.
On top of those issues , there are also issues with even the press releases doing a bad job talking about the study. I try to read the studis when I can, but I also still keep a couple good science reporters in my regular reading that I can trust will know the subject or speak with the experts to ensure good reporting.
I think there is an issue that modern journalism's language is almost the exact opposite of that of scientific publishing. I find good science tries to minimize results, offering a certain conjecture about how it is applicable in general outside the actual experiment, but the language usually tries to hedge bets - a goal of a scientific study's findings is almost to avoid ever being called out. Modern journalism on the other hand is trying to get views which requires bold language, making strong statements and intentionally calling out or challenging stances to draw people in based on the polarizing language.0 -
TheCrawlingChaos wrote: »There are a number of issues at play that make all of those crazy social media reports. One large issue I constantly see is just plain bad reporting by science journalists. Often times it is very evident that the person does not understand the subject matter and didn't consult professionals in the field to help them understand so they can report on it, or they just didn't even read the study. This is why. I always try to tell people to do what it seems most people in this thread dk, and go read the study.
With reading the study on their own, though, you then run into problems with the person's own ability to interpret the study reliably. While some of tr he speak may be plain enough to understand what the words mean, I think it often takes a more trained eye to comprehend the details and pick out any *kitten* in the study itself. I often find myself having to rely on field experts to speak on the study before I can confidently say I feel I know what the study is really saying.
On top of those issues , there are also issues with even the press releases doing a bad job talking about the study. I try to read the studis when I can, but I also still keep a couple good science reporters in my regular reading that I can trust will know the subject or speak with the experts to ensure good reporting.
I think there is an issue that modern journalism's language is almost the exact opposite of that of scientific publishing. I find good science tries to minimize results, offering a certain conjecture about how it is applicable in general outside the actual experiment, but the language usually tries to hedge bets - a goal of a scientific study's findings is almost to avoid ever being called out. Modern journalism on the other hand is trying to get views which requires bold language, making strong statements and intentionally calling out or challenging stances to draw people in based on the polarizing language.
I was watching one of those Mockumentaries about the diet industry. It had an interview with someone who used to do the health segments on either the Today Show or GMA. The guy basically said that they always have to be showing the new diet or some breaking health study that connects to something. He said that the segments were not about sharing information about people's health, but about grabbing some attention, etc. He said that the age old truth of diet management is boring, so those kinds of shows have to mix it up and be as splashy as possible, he openly said at the expense of the actual truth.
Completely why I stick to scientific articles and scholarly sources. Remember SuperSize Me? A scientific team sat down with a group of college students and had them eat the same way that Morgan Spurlock did, and can't recreate his results. He supposedly ate only off of the McDonald's menu, only "supersized" when the staff offered that option. None of the students could come even close to the '5,000' calories a day he claims to have eaten, (Spurlock had to eat a variety of food, but everything on the menu at least once over the course of the month). The doctors checking the students detected none of the liver or renal failure Spurlock's doctor claimed, and none of them experienced the depression or lack of interest in sex that he reported.
Why? Because it was television documentary, not a scientific experiment. No carefully documented/controlled environment, just Spurlock's and the documentary team's word that what they said he was doing, was what he was really doing Considering that he was setting out to prove that the food was really bad for humans, he already had an agenda. How can we trust the information given when there's an 'agenda'? The scientists and the students had no agenda, other than to recreate Spurlock's experiment in a controlled environment and see what happened.0 -
TheCrawlingChaos wrote: »There are a number of issues at play that make all of those crazy social media reports. One large issue I constantly see is just plain bad reporting by science journalists. Often times it is very evident that the person does not understand the subject matter and didn't consult professionals in the field to help them understand so they can report on it, or they just didn't even read the study. This is why. I always try to tell people to do what it seems most people in this thread dk, and go read the study.
With reading the study on their own, though, you then run into problems with the person's own ability to interpret the study reliably. While some of tr he speak may be plain enough to understand what the words mean, I think it often takes a more trained eye to comprehend the details and pick out any *kitten* in the study itself. I often find myself having to rely on field experts to speak on the study before I can confidently say I feel I know what the study is really saying.
On top of those issues , there are also issues with even the press releases doing a bad job talking about the study. I try to read the studis when I can, but I also still keep a couple good science reporters in my regular reading that I can trust will know the subject or speak with the experts to ensure good reporting.
I think there is an issue that modern journalism's language is almost the exact opposite of that of scientific publishing. I find good science tries to minimize results, offering a certain conjecture about how it is applicable in general outside the actual experiment, but the language usually tries to hedge bets - a goal of a scientific study's findings is almost to avoid ever being called out. Modern journalism on the other hand is trying to get views which requires bold language, making strong statements and intentionally calling out or challenging stances to draw people in based on the polarizing language.
I was watching one of those Mockumentaries about the diet industry. It had an interview with someone who used to do the health segments on either the Today Show or GMA. The guy basically said that they always have to be showing the new diet or some breaking health study that connects to something. He said that the segments were not about sharing information about people's health, but about grabbing some attention, etc. He said that the age old truth of diet management is boring, so those kinds of shows have to mix it up and be as splashy as possible, he openly said at the expense of the actual truth.
Completely why I stick to scientific articles and scholarly sources. Remember SuperSize Me? A scientific team sat down with a group of college students and had them eat the same way that Morgan Spurlock did, and can't recreate his results. He supposedly ate only off of the McDonald's menu, only "supersized" when the staff offered that option. None of the students could come even close to the '5,000' calories a day he claims to have eaten, (Spurlock had to eat a variety of food, but everything on the menu at least once over the course of the month). The doctors checking the students detected none of the liver or renal failure Spurlock's doctor claimed, and none of them experienced the depression or lack of interest in sex that he reported.
Why? Because it was television documentary, not a scientific experiment. No carefully documented/controlled environment, just Spurlock's and the documentary team's word that what they said he was doing, was what he was really doing Considering that he was setting out to prove that the food was really bad for humans, he already had an agenda. How can we trust the information given when there's an 'agenda'? The scientists and the students had no agenda, other than to recreate Spurlock's experiment in a controlled environment and see what happened.
I find that funny given how often that's a complaint about getting ridiculously low in body fat, like bodybuilders do. I was just listening to Eric Helms say he wasn't going to be able to intuitively eat coming out of contest phase when he was looking at his naked wife and found himself more interested in the idea of pizza.0 -
TheCrawlingChaos wrote: »There are a number of issues at play that make all of those crazy social media reports. One large issue I constantly see is just plain bad reporting by science journalists. Often times it is very evident that the person does not understand the subject matter and didn't consult professionals in the field to help them understand so they can report on it, or they just didn't even read the study. This is why. I always try to tell people to do what it seems most people in this thread dk, and go read the study.
With reading the study on their own, though, you then run into problems with the person's own ability to interpret the study reliably. While some of tr he speak may be plain enough to understand what the words mean, I think it often takes a more trained eye to comprehend the details and pick out any *kitten* in the study itself. I often find myself having to rely on field experts to speak on the study before I can confidently say I feel I know what the study is really saying.
On top of those issues , there are also issues with even the press releases doing a bad job talking about the study. I try to read the studis when I can, but I also still keep a couple good science reporters in my regular reading that I can trust will know the subject or speak with the experts to ensure good reporting.
I think there is an issue that modern journalism's language is almost the exact opposite of that of scientific publishing. I find good science tries to minimize results, offering a certain conjecture about how it is applicable in general outside the actual experiment, but the language usually tries to hedge bets - a goal of a scientific study's findings is almost to avoid ever being called out. Modern journalism on the other hand is trying to get views which requires bold language, making strong statements and intentionally calling out or challenging stances to draw people in based on the polarizing language.
I was watching one of those Mockumentaries about the diet industry. It had an interview with someone who used to do the health segments on either the Today Show or GMA. The guy basically said that they always have to be showing the new diet or some breaking health study that connects to something. He said that the segments were not about sharing information about people's health, but about grabbing some attention, etc. He said that the age old truth of diet management is boring, so those kinds of shows have to mix it up and be as splashy as possible, he openly said at the expense of the actual truth.
Completely why I stick to scientific articles and scholarly sources. Remember SuperSize Me? A scientific team sat down with a group of college students and had them eat the same way that Morgan Spurlock did, and can't recreate his results. He supposedly ate only off of the McDonald's menu, only "supersized" when the staff offered that option. None of the students could come even close to the '5,000' calories a day he claims to have eaten, (Spurlock had to eat a variety of food, but everything on the menu at least once over the course of the month). The doctors checking the students detected none of the liver or renal failure Spurlock's doctor claimed, and none of them experienced the depression or lack of interest in sex that he reported.
Why? Because it was television documentary, not a scientific experiment. No carefully documented/controlled environment, just Spurlock's and the documentary team's word that what they said he was doing, was what he was really doing Considering that he was setting out to prove that the food was really bad for humans, he already had an agenda. How can we trust the information given when there's an 'agenda'? The scientists and the students had no agenda, other than to recreate Spurlock's experiment in a controlled environment and see what happened.
I find that funny given how often that's a complaint about getting ridiculously low in body fat, like bodybuilders do. I was just listening to Eric Helms say he wasn't going to be able to intuitively eat coming out of contest phase when he was looking at his naked wife and found himself more interested in the idea of pizza.
Good point! I know often boxers and other competitive athletes are forbidden to have sex before big competitions, because it is too strenuous on the body. Even race horses are kept away from opposite-sex horses to prevent this from happening. (Although with your analogy, you'd think they wouldn't want to anyway....)0 -
OP--great thread!0
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snowflake954 wrote: »OP--great thread!
Thanks...and I agree! I like where this has gone. Lots of informative and well-thought posts. Thanks all!0 -
TheCrawlingChaos wrote: »There are a number of issues at play that make all of those crazy social media reports. One large issue I constantly see is just plain bad reporting by science journalists. Often times it is very evident that the person does not understand the subject matter and didn't consult professionals in the field to help them understand so they can report on it, or they just didn't even read the study. This is why. I always try to tell people to do what it seems most people in this thread dk, and go read the study.
With reading the study on their own, though, you then run into problems with the person's own ability to interpret the study reliably. While some of tr he speak may be plain enough to understand what the words mean, I think it often takes a more trained eye to comprehend the details and pick out any *kitten* in the study itself. I often find myself having to rely on field experts to speak on the study before I can confidently say I feel I know what the study is really saying.
On top of those issues , there are also issues with even the press releases doing a bad job talking about the study. I try to read the studis when I can, but I also still keep a couple good science reporters in my regular reading that I can trust will know the subject or speak with the experts to ensure good reporting.
I think there is an issue that modern journalism's language is almost the exact opposite of that of scientific publishing. I find good science tries to minimize results, offering a certain conjecture about how it is applicable in general outside the actual experiment, but the language usually tries to hedge bets - a goal of a scientific study's findings is almost to avoid ever being called out. Modern journalism on the other hand is trying to get views which requires bold language, making strong statements and intentionally calling out or challenging stances to draw people in based on the polarizing language.
I was watching one of those Mockumentaries about the diet industry. It had an interview with someone who used to do the health segments on either the Today Show or GMA. The guy basically said that they always have to be showing the new diet or some breaking health study that connects to something. He said that the segments were not about sharing information about people's health, but about grabbing some attention, etc. He said that the age old truth of diet management is boring, so those kinds of shows have to mix it up and be as splashy as possible, he openly said at the expense of the actual truth.
Completely why I stick to scientific articles and scholarly sources. Remember SuperSize Me? A scientific team sat down with a group of college students and had them eat the same way that Morgan Spurlock did, and can't recreate his results. He supposedly ate only off of the McDonald's menu, only "supersized" when the staff offered that option. None of the students could come even close to the '5,000' calories a day he claims to have eaten, (Spurlock had to eat a variety of food, but everything on the menu at least once over the course of the month). The doctors checking the students detected none of the liver or renal failure Spurlock's doctor claimed, and none of them experienced the depression or lack of interest in sex that he reported.
Why? Because it was television documentary, not a scientific experiment. No carefully documented/controlled environment, just Spurlock's and the documentary team's word that what they said he was doing, was what he was really doing Considering that he was setting out to prove that the food was really bad for humans, he already had an agenda. How can we trust the information given when there's an 'agenda'? The scientists and the students had no agenda, other than to recreate Spurlock's experiment in a controlled environment and see what happened.
I find that funny given how often that's a complaint about getting ridiculously low in body fat, like bodybuilders do. I was just listening to Eric Helms say he wasn't going to be able to intuitively eat coming out of contest phase when he was looking at his naked wife and found himself more interested in the idea of pizza.
Good point! I know often boxers and other competitive athletes are forbidden to have sex before big competitions, because it is too strenuous on the body. Even race horses are kept away from opposite-sex horses to prevent this from happening. (Although with your analogy, you'd think they wouldn't want to anyway....)
That old myth that coaches use to advice athletes might worth its own thread, but it would probably be moved to chit-chat. I'm not sure if the effect kicks in at boxer levels of body fat. A similar, though more 1940s friendly discussion of it, was noted in the Minnesota Starvation Experiment. I wonder if they kept track of roughly what body fat percentage it seemed to kick in at.0
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