1. Science vs Pseudoscience in Speech-Language Pathology
Understanding the Difference and the Implications
With assistance from J. Damico, C. Sagan, M. Shermer, S.J. Gould Eric Hoffer, J.P. Baker, and others.

2. Case Study: Autism CLAIMS There is an epidemic in autism
Mercury poisoning causes autism
Vaccines cause autism (due to mercury poisoning)
Measles, Mumps, Rubella Immunizations cause autism (Wakefield’s “leaky gut”)

3. Autism Epidemic Public outcry in mass media
California DDS increased by 273%
M.I.N.D. Institute: “No evidence a loosening in the diagnostic criteria contributed to increased number of autistic served by DDS
Autism Society of America number of students with autism jumped 1,354% from to
Gave an impetus for the urgency of a more curative approach . Epidemics connote danger

4. Autism Epidemic Not true
Nothing that has occurred in incident change was unpredicted by the scientific community due to the following variables.
Due to a broader concept of autism (co-diagnosis, more & milder)
A recognition of autism among normally intelligent subjects
Changes in diagnostic criteria (DSM 1984 – 1994)
Included in IDEA in 1991
Improved and earlier identification
More professional and public awareness
Incorrect understanding and reporting of referral statistics (height example from MIND)
Methodological limitations of available data

5. Changes in Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders
Placed into the DSM-III only in 1980.
Modified in the DSM-IV (1994)
From six mandatory criteria to 16 optional criteria (only 1/2 needed)
Severe phrasing changed to more inclusive phrasing
Two diagnostic categories changed to five diagnostic categories including two sub-threshold symptoms (PDDNOS, Asperger’s) only 5/8 symptoms
These two account for nearly 75% of current diagnoses

6. IDEA Inclusion Included in IDEA for first time in 1991
Prior to that, no child count in autism
was an optional year (could count or not)
New categories, if viable, increases in usage will occur
1,354% for autism in eight year period
5,5059% for Traumatic Brain Injury
663% in Developmental Delay in three years ( )

7. Mercury and Autism Not demonstrated
At least eight safety review panels of Institute of Medicine (a branch of National Science Foundation)
At least three meta-analyses determined that available data does not support such contention.
Over 18 studies across the world have failed to show a link between mercury in vaccines and autism.
Confusion with the timeline and illusionary correlation…a cognitive error -- MMR months/ months ID
Confusion between the impact of methylmercury and ethylmercury
The vaccines have not had thimerosal in some countries in 15 years…but still see levels of autism
Nothing in US (but some flu vaccines) since 2001

8. These are actually examples of pseudoscientific
reasoning and beliefs that have created
false impressions
problematic service delivery
Inappropriate social policy

9. Boundary Detection Kit
How reliable is the source of the claim?
Does this source often make similar claims?
Habit of going well beyond the facts; more than just an iconoclast
Have claims been verified by another reliable source?
Not just someone within their own belief circle
Who is checking the claims
Who is checking the checkers?
Outside verification is crucial to good science

10. Boundary Detection Kit
Has anyone, including and especially the claimant, gone out of the way to disprove the claim, or has only confirmatory evidence been sought?
Confirmatory bias (tendency to seek only confirmatory evidence)
Science proceeds by honest attempts at falsifiability
Look for and at disconfirmatory evidence
How does this fit with what we know about the world and how it works?
An extraordinary claim must be placed into a larger context to see how and where it fits.

11. Boundary Detection Kit
In the absence of clearly defined proof, does the preponderance of evidence converge to the claimant’s conclusion, or a different one?
Is the claimant employing the accepted rules of reason and the tools of research, or have these been abandoned in favor of others that lead to the desired conclusion?
This is where honest scholarship comes in
Has the claimant provided a different explanation for the observed phenomena, or is it strictly a process of denying the existing explanation?

12. Boundary Detection Kit
If the claimant has proffered a new explanation, does it account for as many phenomena as the old explanation?
Do the claimant’s personal beliefs and biases drive the conclusions, or vice versa?
Peer review system

13. Pseudoscience
A body of knowledge, belief, methodology, or practice that claims to be scientific but does not adhere to the tenets of science
Does not adhere to the scientific method
Lacks supportive evidence
Focuses on resemblances rather than cause-effect relations
Lacks scientific plausibility
Lacks scientific rigor or status.

14. As a result it often employs:
Vague, exaggerated or untestable claims
Over-reliance on confirmation rather than refutation
Lack of openness to testing by other experts
A lack of progress in theory development

15. A Few Points about Pseudoscience
Due to the idea that “Wishing makes it so”
Pseudoscience is embraced in exact proportion as real science is misunderstood
We are dealing with a continuum when dealing with knowledge not a binary choice
Another continuum in the form of scientific competence
One must strike a balance between the two poles of the continua
Absence of critical thinking

16. Differences Between Science and Pseudoscience
In Science
Conclusions are tentative – open for revision
Hypotheses are framed so they are capable of being disproved
Alternative ideas are confronted by systematic observation and analysis (experimental or qualitative)
Skeptical scrutiny is not opposed
The opposite is true in pseudoscience

17. Differences Between Science and Pseudoscience
In Science
Conspiracies are not the reason for lack of advancement
There is an attitude of appreciation of human imperfections and fallibility
The purveyor works in concert with his/her colleagues (not in almost complete isolation)
The opposite is true in pseudoscience

18. A Tool Kit to Detect Difference
Ask the following Questions:
Does the claim not meet the qualifications of a theory?
Theories arise from and supported by systematic observation
Theories results in claims specific enough for falsification
Theories enable one to create specific testable conditions
Theories are couched in tentative language
Is there a defense of the claim by authority?
Typically Claims are announced by mass media
Is there a concern about suppression by authority
Does it sound far-fetched or too good to be true…does it make sense given your knowledge of conventional science … extraordinary claims need extraordinary evidence

19. A Tool Kit to Detect Difference
Does the claim come from a source dedicated to supporting this claim?
Is the claim based upon a positive hypothesis that is supported with questionable evidence and anecdotal reasoning? (Remember, Science starts with a null hypothesis and searches for evidence)
Are claimants not up-front about evidence and procedures?
Are the data of suspect or a questionable quality?
Is the claim oriented to, or intended to show there is something wrong with the norm?
“Yes” answers suggest that you are viewing pseudoscience.

20. Remember that in Science:
When possible there must be independent confirmation of the “facts”
You encourage substantive debate on the evidence by knowledgeable proponents of all points of view
Arguments from authority carry little weight
You should desire to spin more hypotheses & explanations
If there is a chain or argument, every link in the chain must work (even the premise)
One looks to apply Occam’s Razor: when faced with two alternatives, the simpler explanation is usually the best
Ideas can be falsified

21. A question for professionals in a scientific discipline:
Simply Put:
Why do people cling to the continual principles and dictates of poor science and of pseudoscience?

22. When ideas go unexamined and unchallenged for a long time, certain things happen. They become mythological, and they become very, very powerful (E.L. Doctorow)

23. Why do SLPs or parents cling to pseudoscientific concepts and knowledge systems?
Don’t know there are problems
Comes down to what they are comfortable with
Fool themselves
Too defensive
Don’t care if there are problems

24. Don’t know there are problems
Passive learners
Too much faith in what others say
Reactive not Proactive
“Contagion not calculation”
Poor Theoretical Foundation
Don’t keep up with the Research
Not as motivated to keep current

25. Comes down to what they are comfortable with
What I learned
Consumer approach to engagement
Their concept/theory/foundation is flawed
Behaviorism
Reduce complexity
Modularity
Afraid to step into the breach
Istanbul incident
“What I know and use”

26. Fool themselves
Easier to understand why people do this if you regard this “phenomenon” not merely as a set of practices but a sociological belief system
Wood, Nezworski, Lilienfeld & Garb, (2003). What’s wrong with Rorschach? (p ). New York, J. Wiley & Sons.

27. Traps of logic and experience
Clinical experience more valuable than the consistency of theoretical arguments and research findings
Produce Cognitive Errors

28. Cognitive Errors: Faith in Authority
“My teachers in school taught me”
Intellectual subservience to authority
The genetic fallacy (evaluating a claim’s truth in terms of its origins.

29. Cognitive Errors: Social Proof
“Generations of SLPs can’t be wrong”
Truth by determining that other people say and do
“Ad populum” fallacy (must be right because it is so widely held)
“Ad antiquitem” fallacy (must be right because it was held for so long)
Tendency for acquiescence

30. Cognitive Errors: Clinical Validation and Testimonials
“In my clinical experience…”
Easily fall prey to cognitive illusions
Propensity toward confirmation bias
Illusionary correlations
The law of large numbers
As compared with what
Can become fodder for Social Proof

31. Cognitive Errors: Anecdotal Evidence
“Let me tell you about one of my cases…”
Vivid stories are more compelling and memorable…but are illustrations not evidence
Anecdotes may not be typical
Lack comparisons or controls
They are suitably vague

32. Cognitive Errors: Vivid Personal Experience
“I once had this incredible case…”
The Availability Heuristic
tendency for information highly accessible in memory to exert on impact on our perceptions
Hindsight bias
“prediction is difficult, especially about the future”
Niels Bohr
More likely to remember the “hits” than the “misses”

33. Cognitive Errors: Cognitive Illusions
“I see it at work everyday…”
Propensity toward confirmation bias
Illusionary correlations
Tendency to believe it is repeatedly seen when it is not
Overpathologizing illusion
Something that appears to identify many patients is seen as highly sensitive rather than invalid.

34. Cognitive Errors: Reinforcement
“I’ve been highly successful with it…”
Behavior rewarded is likely to recur.
In graduate school… “nice administrations”
Relieves pressure of decision making
Makes documentation easier
Quick and efficient
Social reinforcement from like minded

35. Cognitive Errors: Self-Consistency
“It’s impossible I’ve been wrong all these years…”
Once we make a choice or take a stand, it becomes personal

36. Cognitive Errors: Lack of Alternatives
“Who cares what the research says…”
If they believe there is no alternative, then continue
Istanbul experience

37. Too Defensive Will not admit may be wrong
Will not listen to arguments/data
More willing to save Face than change
Ad Hominem argument too easy

38. Don’t care if there are problems
Have a different agenda
The true believer relevant here

39. The True Believer Eric Hoffer
Discussed how psychological and other states give rise to mass movements (large and small)
Stated that a passionate obsession with external events or movements or with private lives of others is an attempt to compensate for a lack of meaning in one’s life.
With these personalities (and most people) the mass movements are interchangeable
The key is not the movement but that one is a part of a mass movement
Poor, disenfranchised, megalomaniac, outliers

40. The True Believer
Strive to feel a part by “falling in” with a movement or trend.
Conspiracies are not the reason for lack of advancement
Tendency toward paranoia
Considers himself a genius and others not capable
Unjustly persecuted and discriminated against
Strong compulsion to focus attacks on the greatest thinkers or scientists
Science adopts an attitude of appreciation of human imperfections and fallibility
The purveyor works in concert with his/her colleagues (not in almost complete isolation)