I recently wrote about how the media is causing a civil war within the Autism community… it happens with many communities but obviously my focus is on Autism. It’s why you’re here reading my blog.
In response to that, Josie commented with a link to an image which is both hilarious and, more importantly, true.
It’s a very accurate description of exactly how a study can go from a researcher’s lab/desk, through the PR office to the media, through the national and local media, through the bloggers interpretations and finally, to the people.
And sadly, like a really messed up game of Telephone where the original message doesn’t even come close to resembling the final message… the study gets very distorted until what’s being told from person to person isn’t even remotely the same as what the original study concluded.
So the next time you read about a study in the news, or see something on television… remember this image because chances are, this is exactly what happened before it got to you.
Source: http://phdcomics.com (Click for full size)
[…] wrote about it in “The truth about how a research study goes from the lab, through the media, to the people” where you can actually see how a story goes from a researcher to the public and just how […]