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- Title
Epidemiology, public health, and the rhetoric of false positives.
- Authors
Blair, Aaron; Saracci, Rodolfo; Vineis, Paolo; Cocco, Pierluigi; Forastiere, Francesco; Grandjean, Philippe; Kogevinas, Manolis; Kriebel, David; McMichael, Anthony; Pearce, Neil; Porta, Miquel; Samet, Jonathan; Sandler, Dale P; Costantini, Adele Seniori; Vainio, Harri
- Abstract
As an observational science, epidemiology is regarded by some researchers as inherently flawed and open to false results. In a recent paper, Boffetta et al. [Boffetta P, McLaughlin JK, LaVecchia C, Tarone RE, Lipworth L, Blot WJ. False-positive results in cancer epidemiology: a plea for epistemological modesty. J Natl Cancer Inst 100:988-995 (2008)] argued that "epidemiology is particularly prone to the generation of false-positive results." They also said "the tendency to emphasize and over-interpret what appear to be new findings is commonplace, perhaps in part because of a belief that the findings provide information that may ultimately improve public health" and that "this tendency to hype new findings increases the likelihood of downplaying inconsistencies within the data or any lack of concordance with other sources of evidence." The authors supported these serious charges against epidemiology and epidemiologists with few examples. Although we acknowledge that false positives do occur, we view the position of Boffetta and colleagues on false positives as unbalanced and potentially harmful to public health.
- Publication
Environmental health perspectives, 2009, Vol 117, Issue 12, p1809
- ISSN
1552-9924
- Publication type
Journal Article
- DOI
10.1289/ehp.0901194