To err is human

One of the oddest study results in recent years, one which you (probably) never heard about until now, must be the randomized control trial on massage therapy in which the participants—all adults—grew by almost two-and-a-half inches over eight weeks. Odder still: no...

Editorial: On PACE

In 2011, amid many thoughtful avenues of research into a paralyzing syndrome that is as near to an off-switch on life as one can imagine, an $8 million dollar government-funded trial in the United Kingdom bulldozed a highway. The first results of PACE, the largest...

How Statistics Can Solve the BPA Controversy

Editor’s note: The controversy over whether bisphenol A, a component of plastics and can linings, is dangerous to humans is now in its 17th year. Hundreds of millions of dollars have been spent on research by the US and other governments around the world—with intense...

Anatomy of a Statistical Meltdown

“Plastics Chemical Tied to Aggression in Young Girls,” said the headline on ABC News. “The research showed that hyperactive, anxious, aggressive and depressed behavior was more common in 3-year-old girls who were exposed in the womb to bisphenol-A than in boys of the...