tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12602489.post1943028829722346991..comments2024-03-24T15:07:18.773+01:00Comments on The Stuttering Brain: A warning on drug trials!Tom Weidighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02084153394215001999noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12602489.post-12172453302052621552008-01-26T01:16:00.000+01:002008-01-26T01:16:00.000+01:00It’s interesting to speculate whether there’s a si...It’s interesting to speculate whether there’s a similar bias in our own field of interest, stuttering research – with regard to either drug therapies or other interventions, such as speech therapy.<BR/><BR/>It’s easy to find some plausible factors underlying this effect with respect to drug tests, which are typically funded by the drug companies. Some of the factors that motivate this effect are clear – particularly: negative effect on the marketing of the drug, and lack of professional recognition for finding negative results. <BR/><BR/>For non-medical interventions (typically falling collectively within the category of speech therapy), the first factor (big money) is no longer present to such an extent, though not absent entirely. But the professional recognition factor clearly remains. If a stuttering researcher's statistician discovers that kids who have bacon and eggs for breakfast improve their speech at a faster rate than the group he's treating with his own favorite style of therapy, do you think he'll be rushing to report that? <BR/><BR/>Stuttering researchers are not philanthropists. They have interests other than Truth alone. Their decisions to publish or not are based on their own self-interests, which do not always favor full disclosure. Your anecdotal report from your January 23 blog entry asks “Have you ever heard a therapist at a conference talking about their mistakes?” which is surely, in a small sense, an example of this sort of bias.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com