How To Research

         One of the most influential parts of modern media outlets is the accessibility that it offers to both authors and consumers of news and media.  It is with this unrestricted access to produce or read anything that one can type into Google that comes the presence of limitless ungrounded theories.  The wealth and density of articles, opinions and scholarly papers online puts it in the hands of the consumer to search for, and interpret these articles without preliminary bias, and using scientific supporting evidence.  This is my reasoning for saying that promoters of the vaccine-autism link CAN, in fact, be labeled as scientifically illiterate or ignorant (based on the details of their research efforts). 

         For example, our search in class yesterday for ‘whether or not swimming on a full stomach can kill you’ was researched, one article was found, and it said that it could indeed kill you.  At this, the person guessing that celebrated that they were ‘right’ all along.  This example clearly shows that the person who guessed it to be true was starting their search with preliminary bias.  However, the rest can still be saved if you can be discerning about which articles to use as sources.  I’ve just found 3 articles that say that ‘eating before swimming can kill you’ is a myth, and three that support that statement. The rest is left up to searching for unbiased scientific data about the internal biological processes at work in metabolizing food, and in anaerobic exercise. 

         The tendency of people to believe the first “Cosmo” article that they find shows that they are researching their topic improperly.  Firstly, beginning with a preliminary bias in a search makes finding articles that support a vaccine-autism link much easier.  However, the indiscriminate use of articles without researching supporting scientific evidence can be just as damaging to the truth.

         For my grizzly article, I wrote about doctor’s reactions to the vaccine controversy currently going on.  Many doctors are calling for a government-backed project to support vaccine safety to increase the public’s trust in vaccines.  I have learned the same thing from individuals who readily accept Jenny McCarthy’s theories, which is that if you want something with scientific evidence to be realized by the general public, you still have to present the evidence in a flashy way.  Scholarly articles simply do not reach the public as effectively as those backed by large names.