Blog Post: Ethical Research

The general public looks to the scientific community for explanations about everything from genetics to cosmology and what conclusions the scientific returns is how the general public perceives the world we live in. Since the public is not knowledgeable in the whichever field they are reading about, they put a great deal of trust in the scientist to report accurate and truthful data. During our exploration of scientific writing, I have some to discover that scientists are just as effected by their personal bias as the general public, and may unknowingly create a self-fulfilling prophecy in which they only recognize the data that supports their theories. We've also learned that in more extreme cases a researcher will even go so far as to falsify data for their own means. Another problem is that science accommodation writers will report one anecdotal situation as a representative of an entire population, such as the article we read on Autism and vaccines. The study was based on a group of 12 children, and made a sweeping generalization that MMR vaccines caused Autism. This is most certainly not something one could conclude from 12 patients when tens-of-millions of people are getting vaccinated.

When scientists aren't ethical in their research serious consequences can occur; in the case of Autism and vaccines, diseases once thought eliminated are returning due to the loss of "herd immunity" due to the fears of parents. Once scientists release misleading or false information, the media runs with it, making sure to sensationalize the information enough to start a controversy. Then John and Jane Doe read it in the newspaper and believe that their child is at risk (in the former case described). The real problem then arises; the parents believe they have adequate information to determine the safety of their child based on one study they read in the paper.

Scientists and researchers need to be more aware of how their data is going to transmit to the public. Careless reporting will lead to negative opinions about the validity of scientific research, and implants incorrect thoughts into the public's mind. Whenever I read an article or listen to news about scientific claims, I now know not to immediately believe anything (especially if it has anything to do with gender studies or psychology in general). I don't believe that A causes B in any situation; there are countless variables in any study that do not get accounted for. Also I understand that our knowledge is limited (we don't really know anything) and that purple unicorns from outer-space could appear at any time and completely shatter our current beliefs of reality (however unlikely). Like the old saying goes we only truly know two things: we're each going to die and pay taxes until we do. Unfortunately not many people have such a scrutinizing view of what others tell them and groups of people start believing falsified data.