Stats
Taking charges of conflicting interest too far (June 4, 2005).
You should always be aware of potential conflicts of interest. Sometimes
researchers allow a financial incentive to influence their research and end
up skewing the data to achieve a particular outcome.
Does having a commercial interest in the results of a drug trial cause a
problem for the people running the trial? If it does, then much of the
research that we rely on could be flawed. A recent article in the British
Medical Journal raises some serious concerns
(Jurendini 2004).
More uncertain is the belief that researchers working in an area will try
to obtain findings that encourage greater research funding in the area they
work in. This might manifest itself in a tendency to exaggerate the
importance of a particular disease and to overstate the number of people
affected. One author commented that having an NIH grant is the biggest
conflict of interest of all.
While it seems intuitive that such a conflict would exist, I have seen no
empirical evidence to support this. In fact, sometimes this charge is leveled
by people who have an opposite interest and conflict with the research. So,
for example, a common charge is that EPA preferentially funds research that
exaggerates environmental hazards and the researchers funded by EPA try to
deliver this type of finding. Often this sort of charge is a "red herring" by
opponents of environmental regulation intended to sow doubt and confusion.
Another "red herring" was claims about a financial conflict of interest
with the James Randi prize. James Randi, through the James Randi Education
Foundation, has offered a million dollar prize
"to anyone who can show, under proper observing conditions, evidence
of any paranormal, supernatural, or occult power or event." --
www.randi.org/research
This generous offer includes claims for:
"Dowsing. ESP. Precognition. Remote Viewing. Communicating with the
Dead and/or 'Channeling'. Violations of Newton's Laws of Motion (Perpetual
Motion Devices). Homeopathy. Chiropractic Healing (beyond back/joint
problems). Faith Healing. Psychic Surgery. Astrology. Therapeutic Touch (aka
'TT'). Qi Gong. Psychokinesis (aka 'PK'). The Existence of Ghosts.
Precognition & Prophecy. Levitation. Physiognomy. Psychometry. Pyramid
Power. Reflexology. Acupuncture. Applied Kinesiology (aka "AK").
Clairvoyance. The Existence of Auras. Graphology. Numerology. Palmistry.
Phrenology." --
www.randi.org/research/faq.html
Notice the wide range of alternative medicine practices included in this
list. The presence of this challenge allows skeptics of alternative medicine
to ask proponents why they have not applied for this prize. It seems like a
reasonable question to me, but at least one proponent has offered a conflict
of interest charge against James Randi.
The idea of letting a former illusionist with a substantial financial
stake in a negative result supervise a "double-blind" experiment is perhaps
questionable. --
www.weirdtech.com/sci/expe.html
For someone to willing risk the loss of a million dollars shows the exact
opposite to me. It was a response to a challenge that James Randi needed to
put his money where his mouth is. The fact that he wants to supervise the
results of the test rather than cede control to a "neutral" party is just a
sign of reasonable prudence.
Further reading:
This webpage was written
and was last modified on
2008-07-14.
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Category: Conflict of interest
