Apr 4, 2025 04:03 AM
(This post was last modified: Apr 4, 2025 04:07 AM by C C.)
Not all scientific studies are useful
https://www.mcgill.ca/oss/article/critic...are-useful
EXCERPTS: It is obvious that society has been richly rewarded with the fruits of scientific research. [...] The problem is what to do with all that information. How do we separate studies that provide potentially useful data from ones that do not add in any significant way to our knowledge base?
[,,,] Some research is just nonsensical and some is fraudulent. Some are both. Like the paper published in the neuropsychology journal, “Perceptual and Motor Skills” by a scientist from the University of Southern Brittany in France with the intriguing title, “Bust Size and Hitchhiking: a field study.”
As one might expect, this study claiming that women with larger breasts are more likely to be picked up when hitchhiking received a great deal of media attention. The same author published a subsequent study that found blond women were more likely to be successful at hitching a ride. One wonders if he is contemplating another trial to see if blond women with large breasts are even more successful.
Besides the “do we really need to know this” aspect of these studies, it turns out that the author did not have the data to support the conclusions. Neither did he have the data to support his study alleging that women dressed in red are perceived by men as having stronger sexual intent. It took years, but these nonsensical papers have now been retracted by the journal.
[...] Then there are studies that are not fraudulent, nor poorly designed, but provide no useful information... (MORE - details)
Somewhat spuriously related to the scientist mentioned above who conducted bust-size research at the French university:
Jimmy Carr: "Stephen Hawking was a 'big t_ts guy' who loved meeting women at my parties"
https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/weird-n...y-34982768
https://www.mcgill.ca/oss/article/critic...are-useful
EXCERPTS: It is obvious that society has been richly rewarded with the fruits of scientific research. [...] The problem is what to do with all that information. How do we separate studies that provide potentially useful data from ones that do not add in any significant way to our knowledge base?
[,,,] Some research is just nonsensical and some is fraudulent. Some are both. Like the paper published in the neuropsychology journal, “Perceptual and Motor Skills” by a scientist from the University of Southern Brittany in France with the intriguing title, “Bust Size and Hitchhiking: a field study.”
As one might expect, this study claiming that women with larger breasts are more likely to be picked up when hitchhiking received a great deal of media attention. The same author published a subsequent study that found blond women were more likely to be successful at hitching a ride. One wonders if he is contemplating another trial to see if blond women with large breasts are even more successful.
Besides the “do we really need to know this” aspect of these studies, it turns out that the author did not have the data to support the conclusions. Neither did he have the data to support his study alleging that women dressed in red are perceived by men as having stronger sexual intent. It took years, but these nonsensical papers have now been retracted by the journal.
[...] Then there are studies that are not fraudulent, nor poorly designed, but provide no useful information... (MORE - details)
Somewhat spuriously related to the scientist mentioned above who conducted bust-size research at the French university:
Jimmy Carr: "Stephen Hawking was a 'big t_ts guy' who loved meeting women at my parties"
https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/weird-n...y-34982768