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Re:Risky business: linking Toxoplasma infection and entrepre... by cultus on Wednesday December 26, 2018 @10:48AM (#18762681)
This is just p-hacking. It's really sad that in 2018 researchers are still pumping out garbage like this. All of these toxo behavior studies have been very poor quality. For example, there's been a few studies purporting that folks infected with toxo have significantly higher rates of schizophrenia. However, this is false, because toxo rates differ by 2-3x between first-world countries but yet the schizophrenia rate is mostly consistent.
Re:Risky business: linking Toxoplasma infection and entrepre... by chimeracoder on Wednesday December 26, 2018 @12:28PM (#18763286)
> However, this is false, because toxo rates differ by 2-3x between first-world countries but yet the schizophrenia rate is mostly consistent.

I'm not going to say that the original studies are correct, but this is a fallacious analysis as well. You can't use broad, population-based observations (which are subject to countless possible confounding factors) to dismiss a targeted study that attempts to isolate a single cause and effect relationship.

Re:Risky business: linking Toxoplasma infection and entrepre... by cultus on Thursday December 27, 2018 @12:46PM (#18771048)
No, it's not. The effect size that purportedly occurs according to this research (double-digit percentages of cases caused by toxo) would have been detectable on a population level. There would be marked differences in schizophrenia rates, but there aren't. You'd be right if small effect sizes were claimed, but that's not what's being claimed.

Suppose a large portion of schizophrenia cases are caused by toxo. We know the toxo infection rate differs massively between countries, but the schizophrenia rate is consistent. Therefore, there must be another cause of schizophrenia such that its prevalence as a cause of schizophrenia is almost perfectly anti-correlated with toxo infections. More toxo infections, less of this other cause. Or there could be a correlated factor that prevents schizophrenia. Maybe having a cat, in and of itself, prevents schizophrenia.

That seems extremely improbable, considering that a priori we should think that a particular amoeba causes schizophrenia is not probable.

Re:Risky business: linking Toxoplasma infection and entrepre... by rockinghigh on Wednesday December 26, 2018 @12:35PM (#18763340)
It could still hold if only a small percentage of schizophrenia was caused by toxoplasmosis.
Re:Risky business: linking Toxoplasma infection and entrepre... by cultus on Thursday December 27, 2018 @10:28AM (#18769950)
These studies have usually showed a large effect size and a small sample. That doesn't explain it.
Re:Risky business: linking Toxoplasma infection and entrepre... by nerdponx on Wednesday December 26, 2018 @12:59PM (#18763482)
I have seen (but not read or vetted) other studies purporting a relationship between toxoplasmosis and other mood/behavior alterations like depression. Is it all junk, or is there any merit to it?
Re:Risky business: linking Toxoplasma infection and entrepre... by api on Wednesday December 26, 2018 @11:07AM (#18762785)
Time constraints + hyper competitive publish or perish environment = lots of bad or low effort research to pad publication totals.
Re:Risky business: linking Toxoplasma infection and entrepre... by abledon on Wednesday December 26, 2018 @11:08AM (#18762796)
Can someone explain the math behind the ‘p hacking’ for this study?
Re:Risky business: linking Toxoplasma infection and entrepre... by yawaworhtttt on Wednesday December 26, 2018 @11:16AM (#18762827)
I think the best way to explain it is with this link: https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/p-hacking/
Re:Risky business: linking Toxoplasma infection and entrepre... by phaedryx on Wednesday December 26, 2018 @11:21AM (#18762858)
Thank you, this is both awesome and terrible.
Re:Risky business: linking Toxoplasma infection and entrepre... by mfgmfg on Wednesday December 26, 2018 @12:00PM (#18763141)
Alternatively, in comic form: https://xkcd.com/882/
Re:Risky business: linking Toxoplasma infection and entrepre... by DonHopkins on Wednesday December 26, 2018 @01:51PM (#18763849)
Smells more like poop-hacking to me.