PSA - Don’t believe everything you hear
(or everything you see, or listen to, or are told, or read on the internet…)
In the modern age where news and media compete for our undivided (yet limited) attention, it is no surprise that things need to happen quickly, and corners can be cut in an effort to get news to consumers in the most direct, easiest, and potentially least accurate way. Whilst it goes without saying that you shouldn’t listen to every piece of health advice you see on social media (more on this another time), even national and international media and publications can sometimes get it wrong, highlighting even more why it’s important to be skeptical.
Take “The Chocolate Diet”, a study that gained global attention in 2014 as it was reported to help people lose weight. This was a hoax study set up entirely to prove how easily it is to publish junk science and have it grab media headlines around the world. “The Chocolate Diet” was a clinical trial where subjects were randomly selected to consume either:
A low-carb diet
A low-carb diet plus a bar of dark chocolate every day
Or a control group consuming their regular diet.
The study included 18 different measures (weight, cholesterol, well-being) in a sample size of only 15 people. Using a sample size this small, and measuring enough variables almost ensured that a statistically significant result of one of these variables would occur by chance. Whilst the results were real, and showed accelerated weight loss in the group that consumed the low-carb diet plus chocolate, anyone properly critiquing the study should understand that a single study with 15 participants is not sufficient to prove cause and effect. The study was then published in an international journal (bypassing the peer-review system by paying 600 euros to the journal) and once distributed to media it was quickly reported on the Huffington Post, a German newspaper, TV news in America, and a breakfast talk show in Australia. The hoax chocolate study had been executed perfectly to plan.
As a reader and consumer, here are some tips to help you weed through some of the junk science and misinformation that overwhelms us:
Nutrition is nuanced, and detailed, and rarely will bold claims about single chemicals, ingredients, or products being good or bad for you be that simple
Question what the source of evidence for these claims are and whether there are multiple studies or data sets to support this
Does the person making the claim speak matter of factly? Rarely is nutrition information black and white, therefore academics will exercise caution and use phrases like “we think”, “most likely”, “it appears that”, and “evidence would suggest”.
Question the scientific credentials of the person reporting this information - Are they qualified to do so?
Are they trying to sell you the solution to whatever problem they have created?