Ethics

WSJ: Pashler Study on Problematic fMRI Studies

By Adam Kolber

The WSJ article I recently referenced addresses several other neurolaw and neuroethics topics, including the following study by Pashler et al. This study, as Peter Reiner has pointed out, deserves more attention on the blog:

Last month, psychologist Harold Pashler at the University of California at San Diego and his colleagues examined the analytical techniques used in 54 peer-reviewed fMRI brain-scanning studies covering personality traits and attitudes. They included those emotions that might crop up in a criminal trial, including rejection, anxiety, romance, fear, erotic stirrings, virtue, humor and happiness. Half the studies relied on statistical measures of brain activity so poorly analyzed that the findings were worthless, especially when researchers were attempting to assess individual differences, Dr. Pashler reported in Perspectives on Psychological Science . Yet they all had been published in prominent scientific journals.

"In the law, individual differences are the main focus," says Dr. Pashler. "And it often could come down to these voodoo statistics."

Full post as published by Neuroethics and Law on January 26, 2009 (boomark / email).