Eat More Chocolate?
Recently I took a trip up to Wake Forest to attend a Statistics course for the EdD program. The course taught me valauble information about identifying a good research topic and the proper way to do research analysis.
This week, I ran across an article about a journalist that created a fake story that indicated that eating chocolate can make you lose weight. Below is a link to the article and a brief quote from the author:
"Here's a dirty little science secret: If you measure a large number of things about a small number of people, you are almost guaranteed to get a 'statistically significant' result."
The article and research was intentionally created to expose how easy it is to develop fabricated dieting research. The publication released by a journalist was published in more than 20 countries and a half a dozen languages. Lesson of the story...do your research before you believe something posted on the internet! Boy, I hope that article I read about this was true...
Here is the Yahoo! version for anyone not interested in reading the technical elements of the research process: Journalist Duped Millions Into Thinking Daily Chocolate Bars Aid Weight Loss. Here's Why.
Have fun researching!
