Betreff: PSYCHOLOGY RE EVALUATING ES.... |
Von: joanne@guineapigsrus.org
|
Datum: Fri, 27 Jul 2007 17:48:35 EDT |
Iris pointed out the fact at the announcement of the study, they are looking at the Psychological angle so they use a psychologist.
Fox's remark,
"Belief is a very powerful thing," said Professor Elaine Fox, of the University of Essex, who led the three-year study.
"If you really believe something is going to do you some harm, it will."
has no place in a proper scientific research study. It shows the BIAS!!!!
Also the funders of the study needed this, Phone mast allergy 'in the mind' , to save their a.. after the European study, showing many sick people and the latest study about so many children on drugs.
They
wouldn't dare use the likes of Dr Olle Johansson or Graham Blackwell to
do their studies because they would find the truth. They pick the
friendly one's, like Health Canada dose, that way they get the answers
they pay for.
Regards
Robert
==============================================================================================================
Psychol, AFBPsS
Professor
Contact
Details
Room 3.709
Department of Psychology
University of Essex
Colchester CO4 3SQ
U.K.
Contact Details Tel: +44 (0)1206 - 873783
Elaine
Fox, BA, PhD, C Psychol, AFBPsS
Professor
Room 3.709
Department of Psychology
University of Essex
Colchester CO4 3SQ
U.K.
Fax: +44 (0)1206 - 873801
E-mail
username efox add
@essex.ac.uk for email address
Biography
She studied Psychology at University College Dublin, where she
completed her PhD in 1988 on the psychopharmacological mechanisms
underlying anxiety and cognitive processes. Following this she was
appointed Lecturer in Psychology at Victoria University of Wellington,
New Zealand. In 1993 she returned to the northern hemisphere and
lectured in Psychology at University College Dublin before coming to
Essex in 1994. She was Associate Editor of Cognition and Emotion from
1996 until 2001. She was Associate Editor of Cognition and Emotion from
1996 until 2001, and remains on the editorial board. She has also been
appointed as a Consulting Editor of the APA journal Emotion in 2005. I
am currently working on a book entitled 'Emotion Science: An
Integration of Neuroscientific and Cognitive Approaches' to be
published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2007.
"Belief is a very powerful thing," said Professor Elaine Fox, of the University of Essex, who led the three-year study.
"If you really believe something is going to do you some harm, it will."
Dozens of people who believed the masts triggered symptoms such as anxiety, nausea and tiredness could not detect if signals were on or off in trials.
However, the Environmental Health Perspectives study stressed people were nonetheless suffering "real symptoms".
Campaign group Mast Sanity said the results were skewed as 12 people in the trials dropped out because of illness.
In the trial, many of those who blame masts for their symptoms reported greater distress when they thought the signal was on, suggesting the problem has a psychological basis.
"Belief is a very powerful thing," said Professor Elaine Fox, of the University of Essex, who led the three-year study.
"If you really believe something is going to do you some harm, it will."
The study was funded by the Mobile Telecommunications and Health Research programme, a body which is itself funded by industry and government.
Modern appliances
It is unclear how many people in the UK suffer from "electro-sensitivity", an allergy they believe can be triggered by a range of modern day appliances from hair driers to mobile phone masts.
This should be reassuring news for
anyone who is concerned about the possible short-term health effects of
masts Dr James Rubin, King's College London |
But the HPA research did not consider the effects of waves from phone masts, as most of the studies looking at electrical sensitivity were carried out before they were widely introduced.
A number of studies subsequently have looked at the mobile effect, but the Essex experiments are some of the largest and most detailed to date.
After 12 of the sufferers dropped out of the trial, researchers tested a total of 44 people with a history of symptoms against a control group of 114 people who had never reported ill effects from masts.
When the signal was being emitted, and they were told of this, sensitive individuals reported lower levels of well-being.
This was true for exposure to both forms of mobile systems - GSM and UMTS (3G).
However, when tests were carried out in which neither the experimenter or participant knew if the mast was on or off, the number of symptoms reported was not related to whether a signal was being emitted or not.
Chance finding
Two of the 44 sensitive individuals correctly judged if it was on or off in all six tests, as did five out of 114 control participants.
"This proportion is what is expected by chance," the researchers said.
The symptoms were real. As well as reporting feeling unwell, sensitive individuals had sweatier skin and higher blood pressure - both measures of a physiological response.
But this was regardless of whether the signal was on or off.
"Hence the range of symptoms and physiological response does not appear to be related to the presence of either GSM or 3G signals," the study concluded.
Other experts endorsed the study's findings.
Dr James Rubin, of the Mobile Phone Research Unit, King's College London, said the findings were in line with those from most other previous experiments.
"This should be reassuring news for anyone who is concerned about the possible short-term health effects of masts," he said.
But Mast Sanity declared "history has shown that many now commonly accepted physical conditions were initially dismissed as psychological".
"Isn't it time that the government woke up to the reality of electrosensitivity instead of attempting to persuade sufferers that it is all in their minds?" said spokeswoman Yasmin Skelt.
But another campaign group, Powerwatch, commended the research as "one of the best designed and executed studies to date" while stressing that the number of dropouts was unfortunate.
"So whilst it cannot be entirely ruled out that a small minority are truly sensitive, the proportions of any truly sensitive people are likely to be far lower than the 3-35% that has been quoted."