Betreff: Psychological origins of phone mast symptoms - The Psychologist: September 2007, Page 529

Von: G. Carlo

Datum: Sun, 02 Sep 2007 11:36:28 -0400

I find this article in The Psychologist to be offensive to those who participated in the Essex study as well as to those who suffer from debilitating electo-sensitivity and other membrane sensitivity syndrome conditions.  It also underscores a serious deficiency in the system that takes what should be 'reliable' information into the public domain.  The Essex study was seriously flawed as scientific research, and it is a shame that such a sweeping and unwarranted indictment of the lifestyle and mental state of seriously ill patients is being made based on that work.  It is indeed a breach of professional responsibility. 

I would suggest that whatever responses put into print as context for interpretation of the Essex study are also targetted to The Psychologist.  It is a serious problem that this misinformation is continually propagated through collateral professional channels and put out there as credible.  It is important for us to stop those erroneous communications in their tracks before they gain any momentum. 

This misinformation propagated by The Psychologist ironically will cause deep physical and psychological harm to thousands of afflicted patients who will now be misdiagnosed and sent into a path of frustration and spiralling ill health.  That this is a preventable consequence makes this a true tragedy.

Dr. George L. Carlo
Science and Public Policy Institute
1101 Pennsylvania Ave. NW -- 7th Floor
Washington, D.C. 20004
www.sppionline.org
202-756-7744

-----Original Message-----

From: Margaret E White
Sent: Sun, 2 Sep 2007 10:26 am
Subject: Psychological origins of phone mast symptoms - The Psychologist: September 2007, Page 529

This news item about the ESSEX STUDY has appeared in the current issue of The Psychologist (The journal produced by the  British Psychological Society BPS)

I have copied it out [minus photo of mobile phone base station]

Regards,

Margaret

The Psychologist:  September 2007, Page 529

News

Psychological origins of phone mast symptoms

More evidence has emerged that the unpleasant symptoms some people report experiencing when close to mobile phone masts and devices like computers, are not caused by electric fields, and so are more likely to be of psychological origin.

Stacy Eltiti and colleagues at Essex University exposed 44 self-reported electrosensitive participants and 114 controls to electromagnetic signals equivalent to those emitted by mobile phone base stations. The electrosensitive participants , but not the controls , reported lower well-being and  more symptoms when they knew they were being exposed to the signal compared with a no-signal control. Crucially, however, under double-blind conditions (i.e. when they didn't  know whether the signal was on or not), none of the participants showed any difference in well-being and symptoms when exposed to the electromagnetic signal, as compared with a no-signal control.

Writing in Environmental Health Perspectives, the researchers said that people who think they are electrosensitive generally have a poor quality of life and that it was 'imperative to determine what factors' are responsible for their distressing and serious symptoms'

(tinyurl.com/28opn).