H*lf*rds and the 'H' word

[Bryan]

Went into H*lf*rds yesterday (what a mistake that was when I saw a notice in their 'H' sectio. It was worded something like:

'Wear a helmet and save your head.... Studies have show that helmets can help prevent {guse the figure] 88% of head injuries....'(it went on do for 2 paragraphs ina similar manner)

What really interested me as the fact that at the bottom of teh notice it said 'Source British Medical Association'. Now I may be wrong but this seems very much a BHIT press release, and also the 88% figure has nothig to do with the BMA.

Looks like time for yet another letter to H*lf*rds again trying to point them in the right direction.

Bryan

 

[Carl]

Surely if they quoted the source as the BMA, they would have given
directions to the particular article?

 

[Peter Clinch]

Carl wrote:
> Surely if they quoted the source as the BMA, they would have given
> directions to the particular article?

You expect Clueful Behaviour here? You have a serious case of
over-optimism and you should probably lie down at once ;-/

Pete.
--
Peter Clinch Medical Physics IT Officer
Tel 44 1382 660111 ext. 33637 Univ. of Dundee, Ninewells Hospital
Fax 44 1382 640177 Dundee DD1 9SY Scotland UK
net [email protected] http://www.dundee.ac.uk/~pjclinch/

 

[John_Kane]

Carl wrote:
> Surely if they quoted the source as the BMA, they would have given
> directions to the particular article?

These are adwriters not academics! They may not have the slightest idea
where the figures come from. And I think we can be pretty sure they
have not read TR&T 1989

John Kane
Kingston ON

 

[audrey]

On 6 Sep 2005 04:27:00 -0700, "John_Kane"
<[email protected]> wrote:

>
>Carl wrote:
>> Surely if they quoted the source as the BMA, they would have given
>> directions to the particular article?
>
>These are adwriters not academics! They may not have the slightest idea
>where the figures come from. And I think we can be pretty sure they
>have not read TR&T 1989
>
Shirley Adwriters do have to have some idea of where figures come
from, as they have to be able to support their claims if the ASA asks
them about it

 

[PeteC]

audrey wrote:
> Shirley Adwriters do have to have some idea of where figures come
> from, as they have to be able to support their claims if the ASA asks
> them about it

Not necessarily. Copywriters are given a brief of what to include on the ad
by the account manager. The brief may just contain the claim, not the backup
references. The Account Manager is more likely to know about the source of
the claims (if they're any good at their job), but the contract between the
ad agency and the client is generally termed in such a way that if the
client gives them a claim such as this, the client is able to back that
claim up. It's all down to what the client tells the agency, and the agency
will always appear whiter than white in any subsequent enquiry.

Having said that, you are correct in saying that these claims MUST be true,
and if found not to be, the ASA may require that the adverts are taken
down - regardless of whose fault it was.

The ASA is at http://www.asa.org.uk/asa/. If we complain, it will probably
work - the more the merrier.

Pete.

 

[John_Kane]

audrey wrote:
> On 6 Sep 2005 04:27:00 -0700, "John_Kane"
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >
> >Carl wrote:
> >> Surely if they quoted the source as the BMA, they would have given
> >> directions to the particular article?
> >
> >These are adwriters not academics! They may not have the slightest idea
> >where the figures come from. And I think we can be pretty sure they
> >have not read TR&T 1989
> >
> Shirley Adwriters do have to have some idea of where figures come
> from, as they have to be able to support their claims if the ASA asks
> them about it

Well I've never worked in the ad industry but I rather doubt it. Joel
Best in his book "Damn lies and Statistics"has a term for a certain
kind of bogus statistic that escapes me but he describes it as a
statistic that everyone "knows" and doesn't even need to check because
is is self-evidently true, otherwise people would not use it!

The 85% or 88% helmet figure has passed into medical and safety
folklore and I doubt that anyone really checks it out. I have seen it
all over the place including in peer reviewed papers and at least one
medical position paper and to be honest I suspect that often the
author(s) have never even read the original research. I'm fairly sure
the copywriter has not.

John Kane
Kingston ON

 

[Bryan]

audrey wrote:
> On 6 Sep 2005 04:27:00 -0700, "John_Kane"
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >
> >Carl wrote:
> >> Surely if they quoted the source as the BMA, they would have given
> >> directions to the particular article?
> >
> >These are adwriters not academics! They may not have the slightest idea
> >where the figures come from. And I think we can be pretty sure they
> >have not read TR&T 1989
> >
> Shirley Adwriters do have to have some idea of where figures come
> from, as they have to be able to support their claims if the ASA asks
> them about it

Well I've never worked in the ad industry but I rather doubt it. Joel
Best in his book "Damn lies and Statistics"has a term for a certain
kind of bogus statistic that escapes me but he describes it as a
statistic that everyone "knows" and doesn't even need to check because
is is self-evidently true, otherwise people would not use it!

The 85% or 88% helmet figure has passed into medical and safety
folklore and I doubt that anyone really checks it out. I have seen it
all over the place including in peer reviewed papers and at least one
medical position paper and to be honest I suspect that often the
author(s) have never even read the original research. I'm fairly sure
the copywriter has not.

John Kane
Kingston ON

And all this was my point, H*lf*rds have jumped into bed with BHIT in order to try and sell more plastic hats. My assumption is that BHIT literature got passed around, the BMA has changed it's policy statement, things get mixed up and voila, suddenly the BMA are releasing information stating 88% of accidents can be prevented by wearing an egg box.

Bryan

 

[iakobski]

>> The ASA is at...

Unfortunately, by the sounds of the original post it is not an "advert"
as such, simply in-store information, so the ASA are not relevant.
Trading standards /might/ be interested, but I very much doubt it.

Try Halford's head office, by all means.

 

[MartinM]

ISTR the old chestnut about Bran Flakes being scientifically proven to
lower cholesterol was based on one paper.

 

[the-vehicular-cyclist]

John_Kane wrote:
.... snip
>
> The 85% or 88% helmet figure has passed into medical and safety
> folklore and I doubt that anyone really checks it out. I have seen it
> all over the place including in peer reviewed papers and at least one
> medical position paper and to be honest I suspect that often the
> author(s) have never even read the original research. I'm fairly sure
> the copywriter has not.

.... and apparently rarely do peer reviewers examine citations in
research papers:

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn3168

 

[iakobski]

>> .. and apparently rarely do peer reviewers examine citations in
research papers:

That isn't what the paper you cited is saying (or was that irony - you
cited a source without reading it?)

I've peer-reviewed in the past, and sometimes papers cited are hard to
get hold of, so unless it forms part of the argument you don't read it.
For example the author might say, eg "Previous workers have looked at
other aspects [1,2,3,...19], but only Smith et al [20] considered the
xyz we have studied". Now that's great for the citation count for the
first 19 papers, but there's only really a need to read Smith et al.
Also, the chances are Smith works in the lab down the corridor, so you
go and talk to him, or you have Smith's paper on your desk - if the
paper you're reviewing has put the wrong page number in the citation,
the peer reviewer is unlikely to pick that up.

In the article you cite it assumes all copy-and-paste of the citation
means the author has not read it - it's just as likely they did read
it, but used cut and paste for the reference.

 

[Peter Clinch]

the-vehicular-cyclist wrote:

> ... and apparently rarely do peer reviewers examine citations in
> research papers:

Plus, of course, the "peers" of well meaning but not as numerate or
scientifically clued up as it's possible to be medics are, errrr, well
meaning but as not numerate or scientifically clued up as it's possible
to be medics.

A pretty clear case of the blind leading the blind, it's sad to say.

Pete.
--
Peter Clinch Medical Physics IT Officer
Tel 44 1382 660111 ext. 33637 Univ. of Dundee, Ninewells Hospital
Fax 44 1382 640177 Dundee DD1 9SY Scotland UK
net [email protected] http://www.dundee.ac.uk/~pjclinch/

 

[John_Kane]

iakobski wrote:
> >> .. and apparently rarely do peer reviewers examine citations in
> research papers:
>
> That isn't what the paper you cited is saying (or was that irony - you
> cited a source without reading it?)
>
> I've peer-reviewed in the past, and sometimes papers cited are hard to
> get hold of, so unless it forms part of the argument you don't read it.
> For example the author might say, eg "Previous workers have looked at
> other aspects [1,2,3,...19], but only Smith et al [20] considered the
> xyz we have studied". Now that's great for the citation count for the
> first 19 papers, but there's only really a need to read Smith et al.
> Also, the chances are Smith works in the lab down the corridor, so you
> go and talk to him, or you have Smith's paper on your desk - if the
> paper you're reviewing has put the wrong page number in the citation,
> the peer reviewer is unlikely to pick that up.
>
> In the article you cite it assumes all copy-and-paste of the citation
> means the author has not read it - it's just as likely they did read
> it, but used cut and paste for the reference.

This is possible but see my earler post. Also I was looking at an
article on helmet use in skiing/snowboarding and generallly following
up on the references, especially if they were easily accessed on the
Net.

I noticed on reference to helmet use in the first or second paragraph
about skiers in Austria. I was a bit surprised to find that the paper
was refering to protective devices, IIRC, such as wrist or ankle
supports and had no mention what-so-ever of helmets. I read that paper
two or three times trying to find the data about helmets. None. This
could have been simply a minor error in referencing but it is not good
in the first paragraph of the paper. I'm afraid it tended to colour my
reading of the rest of the paper.

Mind you one of my favourite messed up statements is from first
sentence in an article about the Brasilian city of Curitiba by
Rabinovitch & Leitman Scientific American (March, 1996).
"As late as the end of the 19th century,
even a visionary like Jules
Verne could not imagine a city
with more than a million inhabitants."

I've never seen why Verne would even need to imagine this.The problem
of course what that William Playfair, in, I believe, The Statistical
Breviary, London, 1801 (quoted in Wm. Cleveland, Elements of Graphing
Data 1985) shows London England with a population of over 1 million and
Paris with a population of roughly 900,000. And then, I understand
that Rome in the 1st or 2nd century AD is thought to have had a
population of one million or more.

This is not good when the authors were urban planners with the UN and
the World Bank respectively. They did not need to read Playfair but a
littleknowledge of the history of cities might be desirable.

I have taken, as much as I can, to checking references nowadays. I am
becoming very distrustful. I read one review paper (again not in a
peer reviewed journal- I only noticed it because the local paper
mentioned it since a local doctor was one of the authors) a few months
ago where out of about 171 citations 30 of them either were wrong in
some way or not even in the reference list.

John Kane
Kingston ON

 

[Rich]

"iakobski" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>>> The ASA is at...
>
> Unfortunately, by the sounds of the original post it is not an "advert"
> as such, simply in-store information, so the ASA are not relevant.

Surely the whole point of the info is to sell helmets, and therefore it is
an advertisement. Given the way the ASA treated the CTC over some of its
justifiable claims about helmets, they would be guilty of double standards
if they didn't sort this one.

> Trading standards /might/ be interested, but I very much doubt it.
>
> Try Halford's head office, by all means.
>

 

[myname]

Bryan wrote:
>
> Looks like time for yet another letter to H*lf*rds again trying to
> point them in the right direction.
>

I really don't understand what all the fuss is about. Are you surprised
that Halfords is trying to sell more helmets? Are you surprised that
some medics believe a helmet can prevent some injuries?

Protest against compulsion on libertarian grounds by all means, but
your arguments that helmets are no good, so therefore no-one should
wear them is getting boring.

For the record, I don't wear a helmet, although having just read the
"Snapped forks" thread I may reconsider.

 

[Mark Thompson]

> I really don't understand <snip>

You've completely misunderstood why he objected to the sign he saw
displayed. I presume that was deliberate and you're just a troll?

 

[the-vehicular-cyclist]

Thank you for proving my point. Researchers cite the work of others to
demonstrate that their own findings are credible. Why would researchers
quote if no value is added by doing so? If peer reviewers are too lazy
to verify that claims are accurate (which is not uncommon apparently
with helmet papers) then the review process is compromised. Such
practices are unethical and undermine faith in published research. The
latter is already occurring following the scandalous errors found in
case/control research into hormone replacement therapy.

.... and, I did read it and found it to be a pretty damning indictment
of the type you boast to be.



iakobski wrote:
> >> .. and apparently rarely do peer reviewers examine citations in
> research papers:
>
> That isn't what the paper you cited is saying (or was that irony - you
> cited a source without reading it?)
>
> I've peer-reviewed in the past, and sometimes papers cited are hard to
> get hold of, so unless it forms part of the argument you don't read it.
> For example the author might say, eg "Previous workers have looked at
> other aspects [1,2,3,...19], but only Smith et al [20] considered the
> xyz we have studied". Now that's great for the citation count for the
> first 19 papers, but there's only really a need to read Smith et al.
> Also, the chances are Smith works in the lab down the corridor, so you
> go and talk to him, or you have Smith's paper on your desk - if the
> paper you're reviewing has put the wrong page number in the citation,
> the peer reviewer is unlikely to pick that up.
>
> In the article you cite it assumes all copy-and-paste of the citation
> means the author has not read it - it's just as likely they did read
> it, but used cut and paste for the reference.

 

[Bryan]

Bryan wrote:
>
> Looks like time for yet another letter to H*lf*rds again trying to
> point them in the right direction.
>

I really don't understand what all the fuss is about. Are you surprised
that Halfords is trying to sell more helmets? Are you surprised that
some medics believe a helmet can prevent some injuries?

Protest against compulsion on libertarian grounds by all means, but
your arguments that helmets are no good, so therefore no-one should
wear them is getting boring.

For the record, I don't wear a helmet, although having just read the
"Snapped forks" thread I may reconsider.

I would love Halfords to sell more helmets, and preferably those meeting a decent standard such as Snell. However this notice is conveying false information to try and get people, partents in particular, to buy a helmet on the premise that it WILL prevent death, whereas we all know learning how to ride a biek responsibly is by far the best way to prevent head injury.

And no I don't wear a helmet on the road, and I wouldn;t buy one of the ones from H*lf*rds anyway.

Bryan

 

[the-vehicular-cyclist]

Bryan wrote
.... snip
>
> I would love Halfords to sell more helmets, and preferably those
> meeting a decent standard such as Snell.

Not everyone thinks Snell is such a good standard. Snell and fashion
forces helmet makers to pare down the thickness of the foam by using
denser, stiffer liner to meet Snell's "higher" standard. This increases
the G-loading on the brain in a crash.

There's an article at:
<http://motorcyclistonline.com/gearbox/hatz/>
It's about motorbike helmets but the principles are the same for
bicycle helmets.

After reading it, I was glad to be able to say I'm a bareheaded
cyclist.

AB