Indisputably true things which aren't true

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
41

I rate the “sugar doesn’t make your kids hyper” thing as sort of true: actual double-blinded studies have shown that getting “sugar”, by itself, doesn’t have any effect.

http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM199402033300501

Thing is, those were blinded studies - the kids don’t know who is getting sugar.

However, what I think does potentially have an effect, is the excitement of getting a candy or some cake. In addition, the occasions at which kids get sugar in large, visible doses are often occasions which are inherently exciting - like birthday parties. So, there is an association that a blinded study would not pick up.

Though parential perceptional bias also may play a part …

42

Yeah, as a child I would stay up all night wondering where the sun had gone. It finally dawned on me.

43

It could. And I can’t say for certain that my own observations aren’t biased.

But my experience tells me that a psychiatrist who says “Hyperactivity is NOT caused by sugar intake and won’t be helped by a low-sugar diet” AND a suburban Mom who says, “My daughter goes bonkers for an hour after she drinks a Coke” are probably BOTH right, because they’re actually talking about different things.

44

Here’s one that might be good.

“It doesn’t matter what you eat. Food is food.”

45

Don’t touch a baby animal, or the mother will reject it.

It’s perfectly fine to put the baby out of harm’s way. The mother will find it and care for it.

46

I think the advice is to keep people from messing with baby wildlife. If you tell somebody it’s OK to touch an young wild animal, they might actually touch it, pick it up, play with it, something. By telling people it will harm the animal, that mommy will let it die if you pick it up, it prevents a certain amount of harm.

Sometimes we lie to children.

47

Dreams are <insert whatever you’ve been told>

Despite the best efforts of a whole bunch of Brain Scientists, we really don’t know what they mean, or even when they occur (it’s ~90% during REM sleep, ~10% other)

48

Good one.

49

Opera singers are fat.

50

I think most people believe that if you transfer your scent to the baby, the mother will reject it.

51

“Most people believe” is the same as “Indisputably true”.

52

Nasal mucus is green.

53

Studies have shown that parents can’t reliably discern what children had sugar and which ones didn’t.

54

I’ve never heard that. So some people think that cake=broccoli in terms of nutrition?

55

Ancient Chinese medicine is ancient?

56

It’s more like "As long as it’s a balanced diet, eat what you like. Food is food, it doesn’t matter what you eat. "

Granted this one has sort of been edged out by science in the last few decades, but it’s still around.

57

“Who needs sleep? I’ll sleep when I’m dead.”

58

“The Earth is round”… it’s technically an oval; it’s slightly flat at the poles.

59

Which is why I think this is the perfect example for this thread.

Speaking specifically, numerous replicated studies have demonstrated that parents’ perception of their children’s activity level is highly correlated with whether the parent believes that the child has had sugar (usually with a blind control of a sugar substitute, sometimes by the sugar (or not) being given “offscreen” from the parent), and correlates not at all with whether the child actually had the sugar.

That’s not strictly the same as saying sugar has no effect on kids behavior, just that it has no effect on kids behavior that a sugar free equivalent wouldn’t have.

This isn’t really in any doubt, scientifically (the study’s been replicated a number of times in different forms), but most parents find it really, really hard to believe.

60

Food is food.

:wink: