http://health.msn.com/health-topics/articlepage.aspx?cp-documentid=100270848>1=31036
Daily Kitten Chat Forum » The Newsroom
Religion, obesity link studied
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http://www.3dyourwholelife.com/home.html
This is the other side of the study.
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First article was interesting, but more research is needed. Soxsmom, you didn't warn us that your article came with annoying music, so I didn't read it. My recommendation is to go slow on the schmaltz but enjoy the companionship of your fellow whatevers. I also strongly support vigorous shuckling or "holy roller" type movements. Just my 2 cents.
Posted 1 year ago by preciouskitty #
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When I was in college, I took my first course in basic statistics. The professor gave us an example of correlation in which ice cream sales were significantly associated with drownings in a local lake. She then asked the class to explain the association. Students proposed several possible explanations; the one I remember is that eating ice cream may give people stomach cramps when they go swimming, leading them to drown.
The professor then explained the association. Temperature, specifically hot weather, drove the correlation. In hot weather, people eat more ice cream. They also engage in water sports more frequently, which gives them more opportunity to drown. Neither ice cream sales nor drowning caused the other. This was an illustration of the very important statistical principle, "correlation is not causation".
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Kilroy... I liked your mildly snarky comment. :)
Posted 1 year ago by 12PAWZinFL #
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For some of us, it works to trust our own personal research, tempered by good common sense, and compare our discoveries to those of other individuals, study groups, etc.
For example, since 2009 I started trying to become a more healthy individual, a better person and closer to God.
Since 2009, I started praying more, watched what I was eating, lost weight, started exercising, and soon became a healthier and happier person. If I look at the chain of cause and effect, it all started with prayer and a desire to love God better.
Then, everything else fell into place.
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Thanks 12p, but I didnt' want to make anyone feel bad for posting articles. I just shake my head at the endless "research" and the equally endless articles about said research. Can't we all just get out of each other's way and let each person live their life as they choose?
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Now, now, Kilroy, I make my living helping people do endless research, and we have discovered some very important things that have helped young people to grow into healthy and capable adults.
The endless articles in the media are another thing. Our own research has been flat-out misrepresented in the press, and I wouldn't be surprised if other people's projects were treated the same way. Valid research involves a lot of technicalities and qualifiers; the media want an attention-grabbing headline. The two do not blend well.
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"Now, now" Leeny. I'll keep that in mind the next time some scientific study is announced trumpeting that water is wet or people eat when they're stressed.
As for the media (which is where I work), sure they love a good headline, but they can only work with what they're given. If the study is flawed, or pointless, that's not the fault of the media.
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I have to agree with Leeny-association is NOT causation. In research, associations are useful to help generate new hypotheses to be tested. You will drive yourself crazy trying to drink coffee, not drink coffee, attend services, become an atheist, drink no alcohol, drink moderate amounts of alcohol, eat lots of whole wheat pasta, eat no carbs...
One semi-famous association-is-not-causation story in genetics research involves the "chopstick gene"...
"Once upon a time, an ethnogeneticist decided to figure out why some people eat with chopsticks and others do not. His experiment was simple. He rounded up several hundred students from a local university, asked them how often they used chopsticks, then collected buccal DNA samples and mapped them for a series of anonymous and candidate genes.
The results were astounding. One of the markers, located right in the middle of a region previously linked to several behavioral traits, showed a huge correlation to chopstick use, enough to account for nearly half of the observed variance. When the experiment was repeated with students from a different university, precisely the same marker lit up. Eureka! The delighted scientist popped a bottle of champagne and quickly submitted an article to Molecular Psychiatry heralding the discovery of the 'successful-use-of-selected-hand-instruments gene' (SUSHI).
It took another 2 years to discover that SUSHI is a histocompatibility antigen gene that has nothing to do with chopstick use but just happens to have different allele frequencies in Asians and Caucasians, who of course differ in chopstick use for purely cultural rather than biological reasons. Even though the association data were highly significant and readily replicated, they were biologically meaningless."
from Nature: http://www.nature.com/mp/journal/v5/n1/full/4000662a.html
Not to diss religion, Emma, but you "watched what I was eating, lost weight, started exercising, and soon became a healthier and happier person." Those changes were the direct cause, not prayer. For you, "prayer and a desire to love God better" was the impetus for change. For others, it might be the birth of a child/grandchild, or some other secular event.
Posted 1 year ago by Kiplings_cat #
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I don't think that it's real (I hope not! Your tax dollars at play!)
Posted 1 year ago by Kiplings_cat #
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Appears to be lots of snarky comments.
An article was posted--I find that my association with the church and God helped to support me to lose the as of now 212 pounds. Although I am still over weight--I can walk--something I had a very difficult time doing before. Was the church what made me lose weight--naw it was the doctor who cut me up and put me back together a little smaller again--then the healthy diet. But I would not have survived with out the support of my husband and those that are like my family in my church. Support and love are just as important to someone losing weight as the diet and the exercise. Doesn't matter where you find the support you need--with no support very few are willing to change no matter how horribly their life maybe going.
Emma--amen to the nachoes and sour cream!! Lisa can we please add a few jalepenos?
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I wasn't going to say anything else about our research, but I've decided I'm going to say it because of something going on in our town right now. On Tuesday, two police officers were shot in the line of duty while investigating a carjacking and kidnapping. A pair of brothers stuffed a man into the trunk of his car and said they would kill him if he didn't give them money. The man was able to escape from his trunk unharmed, but the officers who responded to the call were shot before they could even get out of their cars. One was wounded as he opened his car door; the other was killed before he could even open his door. The shooter is still at large; his brother is in custody. Another brother in this family has already been killed during the commission of a crime. He was holding a gun to a police officer's head; the officer was able to escape the hold and shoot the perp with his service revolver.
Our research is not in criminal justice. It is in child development and family relations. Right now, we are working on developing a series of preventive intervention programs for families with the demographic characteristics of these brothers. These programs are based on 15 years of research with the targeted population. They are designed to teach parents and young people together how to keep young people out of trouble and on a track to a successful, productive life. We targeted prevention of drug use and unsafe sex, but have found that the programs are also effective in preventing conduct problems. There are developmentally appropriate programs for preadolescents, adolescents, and young adults. The program evaluation studies are longitudinal and well controlled. The effects of the program for preadolescents remain six years after families took part in it.
This is the point of my remarks. Somewhere in our area, one or more families may be struggling right now to keep their kids away from drugs and delinquency. If our programs can help them to do that, it may save the lives of some police officers in the future.
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Leeny, I hear you about important research getting twisted, especially by the media.
I have a soapbox item of my own: the media has married SSRIs to an increase in suicide in "young adults." The fact is, anytime a person is profoundly depressed, and they start to feel better (for whatever reason) they may finally get the impetus they need to carry out a suicide they had been too depressed to initiate. The problem isn't the drug--it's the effectiveness of the drug. Anyone in transition who has a mental illness should be very carefully monitored. But the media has hysterically made it the medicine's fault.
This makes me grind my teeth at night.
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"If the study is flawed, or pointless, that's not the fault of the media."
Kilroy, I totally disagree with this. Science journalists should have training in science, and part of their job as journalists is to question and be skeptical of their sources of information. This is what journalists pride themselves on!
The reality is that most science journalists these days know nothing about what they're reporting on. There are exceptions I can think of like John Horgan, but most repeat back what they hear (often incorrectly), just with more sensationalism.
Posted 1 year ago by GhostOfColemanYoung #
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Lisa, I totally agree with you, that's what I think too, based on my experience with SSRIs. That's what I reckon, that when you first start taking the SSRIs, you immediately feel more capable and able to do things but you don't actually start to feel happier for a few weeks -- and in that initial period, I am terribly afraid people may finally have the strength and purpose to accomplish what they've thinking about for so long. That, anyway, is how I felt.
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SM, it was never really a choice for me. Being brought up a Roman Catholic, and knowing how it would affect my friends and family meant that though I had those thoughts at the worst times, I knew it was never anything I could actually do (though occasionally I did wish a big bus would come and run me over, lol). As soon as I started taking the SSRIs, which have been a godsend for me, I knew things were going to get better as long as I could wait it out, and they did, and very quickly. I think that's what it's important to emphasise to people who are depressed -- just hang on, and keep hanging on, there is a way through and you will find it.
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Leeny, I hate to be the bearer of bad tidings but 15 years isn't nearly enough. By 1996 what is happening now had been in the works since at least the 80s. Good luck anyway though. At least it seems like you and your group may be trying to do something, as opposed to those who said for so long - not my problem. Just my $0.02
Posted 1 year ago by HuddysMama #
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