Archived material Access restricted Article
Rantburg

Today's Front Page   View All of Tue 05/20/2008 View Mon 05/19/2008 View Sun 05/18/2008 View Sat 05/17/2008 View Fri 05/16/2008 View Thu 05/15/2008 View Wed 05/14/2008
1
2008-05-20 -Short Attention Span Theater-
Study: Using a mobile phone while pregnant can seriously damage your baby
Archived material is restricted to Rantburg regulars and members. If you need access email fred.pruitt=at=gmail.com with your nick to be added to the members list. There is no charge to join Rantburg as a member.
Posted by gorb 2008-05-20 00:00|| || Front Page|| [11129 views ]  Top

#1 Russian version of GW?
Posted by g(r)omgoru 2008-05-20 07:42||   2008-05-20 07:42|| Front Page Top

#2 Oops, wrong analogy. A better one would be Lysenko Lives!
Posted by g(r)omgoru 2008-05-20 07:47||   2008-05-20 07:47|| Front Page Top

#3 This can only mean......more government funded studies!
Posted by Procopius2k 2008-05-20 09:05||   2008-05-20 09:05|| Front Page Top

#4 Why would y'all dismiss this out of hand? The brain a) works via electrical signalling and b) develops through reinforcement of signals in given frequencies / areas of the brain. Seems pretty likely that there are subtle effects over time, especially on kids whose brains are still developing.

-- lotp, who does some artificial neural modeling and other types of machine pattern recognition machine lus reasoning too ....
Posted by lotp 2008-05-20 09:32||   2008-05-20 09:32|| Front Page Top

#5 Why dismiss it out of hand? Because wolf has been called too many times. What else does cell phone usage correlate? Working mothers?
Posted by Nimble Spemble 2008-05-20 10:43||   2008-05-20 10:43|| Front Page Top

#6 A first sceptical look at claims is one thing. Knee jerk rejection of well-performed studies done by people who are NOT known to "cry wolf" about cell phone use is quite another -- especially when, as the article notes, there are animal studies showing physical brain structure changes in response to proximity of low-strength radio waves.

It's bad enough we get junk science with a left wing tilt. But I'm seeing far too much deliberate Know Nothing ignorance from the right for my tastes. And as far as other correlations go,

a) Not necessarily working mothers - a fair number of families have no land lines at all, relying on cell phones & sometimes also Internet phone service.

and b) The authors themselves are clear on what is and is not established by this study alone, as one of the paragraphs in the excerpt above makes clear.
Posted by lotp 2008-05-20 11:28||   2008-05-20 11:28|| Front Page Top

#7 lotp: But I'm seeing far too much deliberate Know Nothing ignorance from the right for my tastes.

Actually, "Know Nothing ignorance" is another name for the null hypothesis, which - in this case - would presumably state that the frequency of behavioral problems is the same for both users and non-users of cell phones, all other things being equal. The problem with a lot of these studies is that in disproving the null hypothesis, the researchers have missed some vital X factor, that is not equal between the two populations. (At the same time, let me just say that if the sacrifice required to stay on the safe side of this recommendation is trivial with respect to your daily routine, then why the heck not).
Posted by Zhang Fei">Zhang Fei  2008-05-20 11:43|| http://timurileng.blogspot.com]">[http://timurileng.blogspot.com]  2008-05-20 11:43|| Front Page Top

#8 Nope, ZF. I'm not talking about a correctly formed hypothesis. I'm talking about a deliberate rejection of science, critical thinking and academic studies. I'm talking about museums that teach children that Adam and Eve walked among the peaceful dinosaurs. And about knee jerk rejection of even well-structured and run studies.
Posted by lotp 2008-05-20 11:51||   2008-05-20 11:51|| Front Page Top

#9 Lotp, afaict there isn't anything in particular "right-wing" about the skepticism in this case.

Over the last decade or so I've seen people become increacingly skeptical of this apparent push from the medical establishment to reclassify various behaviors as medical or psychiatric conditions, with ADD as the prime example.
Posted by Abdominal Snowman 2008-05-20 12:09||   2008-05-20 12:09|| Front Page Top

#10 Most of the commenters here are right wingish. And moonbat conspiracy theories are savagely and joyfully critiqued. I'm just pointing out that it's no virtue to develop a parallel anti-science allergy.
Posted by lotp 2008-05-20 12:19||   2008-05-20 12:19|| Front Page Top

#11 Lotp, take a look at the physics of the problem. Cell phones radiate 2W or less (.25W avg I think). A fetus is about 20 inches from the phone. The electric field there is 400 times weaker than that 1 inch away (caller's brain). In addition, cell phone frequencies are chosen for their long range transmission (i.e. are not easily aborbed by the atmoshphere, including the all important O-H bond).

Many studies and large amounts of money have been spent trying to link cell phones with user damage (think of the giga-dollars lawsuits would rake in). Yet there is no conclusive study showing cell phone use damages any part of the caller's head, even the eyes which are very close to the source and have minimal perfusion.

I would more concerned with wireless home networking and cordless phones (2.4GHz) and especially leaky microwave ovens (2.45) which by design generate microwaves at an O-H absorption peak.
Posted by ed 2008-05-20 12:26||   2008-05-20 12:26|| Front Page Top

#12 ed, what do electric blankets radiate?
Posted by Nimble Spemble 2008-05-20 12:29||   2008-05-20 12:29|| Front Page Top

#13 ed, consider the chemistry of it. Even minute amounts of EM affect the valence of neurochemicals. And those cascade to control other metabolic signals which do reach the fetus.

Your model is woefully restricted in its mechanics.

That said, did anyone actually read the full article carefully? Because the authors of the study explicitly stated that they were not proposing causality was established by this study. They WERE stating that the correlation was unexpected, very large and sufficiently disturbing to warrant a closer look.

That's what responsible scientists do. And the first reaction here wasn't hmmm , it was to invoke Lysenko.

Although, that might have inadvertently been more correct that the commenter realized, given the very preliminary insights we're gaining into the way in which the environment around a cell's membrane influences major metabolic expressions of genes. It's becoming clear that genetic management of cellular processes is far from being a simple mechanical cause/effect linkage.

But at any rate, guys, at least read the whole news article before dismissing the study. Sigh.
Posted by lotp 2008-05-20 12:41||   2008-05-20 12:41|| Front Page Top

#14 Oh, and those studies that established no "user damage" to adults using cell phones? Kindly note that one of the key contributors to those earlier studies is an author of this study.
Posted by lotp 2008-05-20 12:42||   2008-05-20 12:42|| Front Page Top

#15 Lotp, microwaves don't effect valence electrons. That occurs at much higher fequencies (think near IR and above). At microwaves freqs, the mechanism is dipole alignment with the electric field (i.e. the molecule vibrates with the electric field and heats up). Any damage with be thermal (e.g. denatured proteins). Any damage will be about 3 orders of magnitude greater in the cell phone user than a fetus. (e.g. damage to a transport protein

As you said the study is stating a possible correlation. Unless this or follow on studies can show a plausible mechanism, this study resides in the bad science drawer. Useful only to sensationalist journalists and neo-Luddites.

One proposal I will toss out is the study participants have higher incomes and smaller families than average. They are more likely to notice Johnny is "hyperactive" and equate it it some dysfunction than a "normal" family with several kids.
Posted by ed 2008-05-20 13:03||   2008-05-20 13:03|| Front Page Top

#16 Unless this or follow on studies can show a plausible mechanism, this study resides in the bad science drawer.

And aren't follow-on studies exactly what these scientists say are needed?

Sheesh. And double sheesh.
Posted by lotp 2008-05-20 13:06||   2008-05-20 13:06|| Front Page Top

#17 Lotp, I'm uncertain the backlash is right-wing or left-wing per se, people are just getting tired of hearing how we're all Sinners In The Hand Of An Angry God biochemistry.... down here in the basement of society, the average working person is going to see the phrase "behavior problems" or worse "ADD" and they're going to tune the whole thing out.

They're not going to know beforehand any reasons why this study is more likely to be right than the many other studies that turned out to be bogus.
Posted by Abdominal Snowman 2008-05-20 13:07||   2008-05-20 13:07|| Front Page Top

#18 I threw that line as a throw away, being a former research scientist, in the field of EM-tissue interaction by the way. Going by previous studies, I think the odds of finding cell phone causing developmental defects is very low. My bet is on socioeconomic differentiators of the study population.
Posted by ed 2008-05-20 13:16||   2008-05-20 13:16|| Front Page Top

#19 AS, I understand where you're coming from.

Do you see where I'm coming from?

The answer to politicized science is good science. And when it's performed it deserves recognition. The authors of this study (which has to suffer the depredations of journalistic reporting) have done many things right, the lack of which has been appropriately criticized in other reports.

* Their data sets are large and cover a wide range of ages within a culture whose members are mostly homogeneous in terms of ethnic background, economic status etc.
* They do not claim more than their data shows - i.e. statistical correlation
*They do not claim to have discovered causal mechanisms -- and the article is, therefore, to be published in the journal Epidemiology not Neuroscience

Moreover, the study team has earned the right to be taken seriously on this issue. Kheifets

wrote three and a half years ago that the results of studies on people who used cell phones "to date give no consistent evidence of a causal relationship between exposure to radiofrequency fields and any adverse health effect".

Now he's found some suggestive correlation and many are taking it seriously enough to begin thinking about how to study potential causal mechanisms.

It's a decent picture of GOOD science, not junk science. And unless we want to revert to living in superstition good science is worth defending. Because G*ds know, we've got plenty of supersitition and conspiracy thinking and just plain old intellectual laziness eroding the basis of western prosperity these days.
Posted by lotp 2008-05-20 13:20||   2008-05-20 13:20|| Front Page Top

#20 ed, the studied population is Danish. Even with recent immigration that is likely to be pretty homogeneous in terms of ethnic background, economic status etc.
Posted by lotp 2008-05-20 13:23||   2008-05-20 13:23|| Front Page Top

#21 The basic belief is no matter what we do, or how we do it, or when we do it, or where we do it, we are all going to die anyways.
If grants are available for me to prove my hypothesis, I'm all ears...
Posted by tu3031 2008-05-20 13:28||   2008-05-20 13:28|| Front Page Top

#22 I didn't mention anything about race and immigration. I was thinking more in terms of income, family size and child rearing.

Specifically, cell phone users have higher incomes. Higher incomes correlates with higher intelligence. Intelligent kids more likely to exhibit the symptoms of hyperactivity.

Higher incomes correlates with smaller family size. Smaller family size correlates with increased individual supervision. Too much supervision (e.g. keeping track of your kids by cell phone) leading to symptoms of neuroses in the children.
Posted by ed 2008-05-20 13:39||   2008-05-20 13:39|| Front Page Top

#23 Anyone have any data or information related to breast cancer in young women (under 35) and the use of computers?
Posted by Besoeker 2008-05-20 13:46||   2008-05-20 13:46|| Front Page Top

#24 Specifically, cell phone users have higher incomes

Do you have current, well documented validation for that assumption? Because a quick look around the inner city slums in my part of the US does NOT suggest that's true here.

Moreover, income disparities are much smaller in Denmark than in the US -- and Denmark is where the study was performed.
Posted by lotp 2008-05-20 14:19||   2008-05-20 14:19|| Front Page Top

#25 So, here's why this matters so much to me (and why I've cluttered Master Fred's site with this many comments on the thread):

I spend a chunk of my rather rare free time working to attract kids to math, science and engineering. Not by dumbing it down, but by offering them challenging but doable activities like programming robots and analyzing their sensor data.

Every person I work with in this - like my colleague who heads a major lab at IBM - knows that a big factor in our ability to get kids into these disciplines is the public image that scientists and engineers have. In the 50s and 60s that image was good. Today it's pretty ragged as a result of many years of attacks, mostly from those who assert that there is no objective truth but also from those who prefer superstition to science.

Without those kids in those disciplines our future lifestyle and even military security is under serious threat. Not only because of China etc. but also because kids who can't analyze facts and know the limits of an analysis end up swooning for the likes of Al Gore and O'bama.

There's LOTS at stake here.

So trash away when the science is junk. But for all our sakes, recognize when it's not!!

Let's see, where does this soap box go when we're not using it? ....
Posted by lotp 2008-05-20 14:31||   2008-05-20 14:31|| Front Page Top

#26 ADD is real. Sometimes it is caused by significantly slower than normal maturation of that part of the brain which thinks before action, and some 25% of those catch up with the normal population by age 25 or so, recent fMRI studies have shown. In those cases Ritalin or caffeine help the child maintain concentration. In some number of cases it is caused by lack of sleep or ongoing stress which, when dealt with, cause the ADD behaviour to evaporate. In such cases the administration of Ritalin or caffeine, while enabling short-term concentration, will exacerbate the underlying problem(s). ADD is in actuality a description of a behavioral issue, but not a diagnosis of the underlying problem, and a good therapist will explore the possibility that the problem is not simply a physical brain issue. "Boys will be boys" is all very well, but only those boys and girls with a real physical brain problem will benefit from a prescription of Ritalin -- the rest will be obviously made worse, something I've seen in my own circle, so the child was taken off the medication at her own request.

As for the study in question, I'd like to see further longitudinal studies undertaken, but it does make sense to me that fetal development would be responsive to... just about anything. Even slight vitamin deficiencies can cause significant outcomes if occurring at a critical stage of fetal development.
Posted by trailing wife ">trailing wife  2008-05-20 14:37||   2008-05-20 14:37|| Front Page Top

#27 Researcher Says Media Misinterpreted Study on Cell Phones, Behavior Problems
Posted by ed 2008-05-20 14:43||   2008-05-20 14:43|| Front Page Top

#28 No doubt that our journalists are scientifically illiterate and prone to bad reporting of such studies.

Even the Independent did report the authors' caveats, tho, the histrionic headline notwithstanding. ;-)
Posted by lotp 2008-05-20 15:08||   2008-05-20 15:08|| Front Page Top

#29 I don't know enough about the science to take a position on this issue, but I agree with much of what lotp says re: knee-jerk reactions to scientific studies on both extremes and the corrosive affect this can have on the sciences as a profession.

All that said: AFAIK the only definitive studies linking cell phone use to actual damage was that conducted by the Mossad a few years ago, though the data set was quite small.
Posted by xbalanke 2008-05-20 15:30||   2008-05-20 15:30|| Front Page Top

#30 Not sure on the back and forth here, but Ed is exactly right on the physics discussed. As far as women(and men) with cellphones, I would like to snatch them away before they park their behinds under a steering wheel. There seems to be a direct correlation on attention loss when they drive with their mouths(brains) distracted.
Posted by Woozle Elmeter 2700 2008-05-20 16:58||   2008-05-20 16:58|| Front Page Top

#31 Thank you for working with our future scientists and engineers and I agree there is a lot at stake here. But recognize that a lot of the damage to the reputation of scientists has been done by educationists, journalists, politicians and scientists themselves. They joined the war effort in WWII, made great contributions and fell under the spell of federal funding. Now they too often play the tune they're paid to, not the truth. And too often the tune they play is distorted when amplified by the journos and politicos. It should be no wonder if the initial reaction to any sweeping PC pronouncement like "Using a Mobile Phone while Pregnant can" (not may, CAN) seriously damage your baby is strong skepticism and cynical searching for ulterior motives. Scientists need to clean house. I'd prefer they start on AGW and CO2.
Posted by Nimble Spemble 2008-05-20 17:02||   2008-05-20 17:02|| Front Page Top

#32 I still call bullshit until some very, very, VERY strong and solid evidence is presented. Most of studies like this one have a tendency to be complete crap and proven as such 10 years down the road after everyone freaks out and legislation is passes to "protect" us. Of course, once it is proven to be crap, the law is never removed.

Plus, my wife used her cell-phone 10-20 times a day during her pregnancy and our son is one of the most well behaved kids out there.
Posted by DarthVader">DarthVader  2008-05-20 17:14||   2008-05-20 17:14|| Front Page Top

#33 Well, maybe the hypothesis is true, maybe it's not. There is no dishonor in proposing an incorrect hypothesis as long as it's done with practical and honest intentions in mind.

So until someone or history disproves this hypothesis which doesn't seem to be founded on any kind of bad intentions, I will continue to carry my cell phone in my pocket in vibrate mode. You can call me to talk about it if you wish at 555-1212.
Posted by gorb 2008-05-20 19:19||   2008-05-20 19:19|| Front Page Top

#34 A hypothesis cannot be tested by means of correlative analysis, even by (as attempted in the study) partialing out some variables -- unless you have a large enough (and appropriately constructed) data set so that you can apply hierarchical linear modeling. What the study says at this point is that you can't rule out that cell phones may pose problems, you just can't determine that they do.

Makes me want to cut down on using my cell phone, but not certain that I must . . .
Posted by cingold 2008-05-20 19:34||   2008-05-20 19:34|| Front Page Top

#35 555-1212

Isn't that like 867-5309?
Posted by DarthVader">DarthVader  2008-05-20 20:25||   2008-05-20 20:25|| Front Page Top

#36 No, it's like BE-4-5789.
Posted by Nimble Spemble 2008-05-20 20:47||   2008-05-20 20:47|| Front Page Top

#37 I'm just a poor little civil engineer, who happens to be one of those among the 30,000 who disagree with global warming, but I have the same opinion about both MMGW and MCPUWP -

It may be cause for concern, but it is not cause for alarm.

*MCPUWP = Mobile Cell Phone Usage While Pregnant
Posted by Bobby 2008-05-20 20:59||   2008-05-20 20:59|| Front Page Top

#38 One of the most overlooked factors I've found in "diagnosing" ADD is accounting for stress. Stress, especially prolonged stress, can do all kinds of nasty things to the human body, including changing the chemical composition of some of the enzymes essentila for good physical and mental health. One of the major problems with all the "scientific outrage" is that it induces stress where there's no need for it. As someone else said, it seems like we're trying to frighten ourselves to death. People who use cell phones may be more inclined to engage in stressful behavior. Stress is just ONE of more than 40 different conditions that can affect fetal development. Blaming it on an outside stimulus may make the authors of this report feel better, but it may not be entirely accurate. I react with skepticism because I've read too many of these kinds of reports - many of which turned out later to be totally bogus. The mane-steamed-media is part of the problem, but so are some scientists. Too many people want to blame their or their children's problems on some outside agent, instead of accepting that their behavior was the most significant contributing factor. I'd be willing to bet a bag of fresh bagels against this proving legitimate over the long run.
Posted by Old Patriot">Old Patriot  2008-05-20 23:50|| http://oldpatriot.blogspot.com/]">[http://oldpatriot.blogspot.com/]  2008-05-20 23:50|| Front Page Top

23:50 Old Patriot
23:45 bigjim-ky
23:32 Frank G
23:27 rjschwarz
23:18 bigjim-ky
23:13 bigjim-ky
23:05 bigjim-ky
22:58 Frank G
22:54 Free Radical
22:49 JosephMendiola
22:48 Jan
22:36 Eric Jablow
22:32 bigjim-ky
22:31 Redneck Jim
22:27 Frank G
22:25 Frank G
22:23 Ryan McGeeney
22:11 JosephMendiola
21:56 trailing wife
21:53 trailing wife
21:51 JosephMendiola
21:50 Bobby
21:37 JosephMendiola
21:24 tu3031









Paypal:
Google
Search WWW Search rantburg.com