Info Buzz
Recently a journalist reviewed a medical article and wanted to impress the editor. Here the journalist needed a Headline that would attract readers. We will see that by just shifting or changing a word or two can alter the outcome. Here the Headline states that your diet or inactivity does not raise the risk of Dementia; totally false. Your diet and activity are directly related to your mental functioning; so here we have confusion in the title. The journalist may have extrapolated the information; thus injecting their own conclusions. But the real tragedy is that the huge majority of information being buzzed back and forth in our Social Media Society produces doubt and confusion. The confusion in the nutrition aspect of our society is, always has been, and, I predict, always will be ‘doubt’.
It’s the perfect solution; project ‘doubt’ to 100 people, impress doubt upon doubt to stimulate ‘mass engagement’ and suddenly you will have convinced a huge percentage that the doubt is now the answer. Let’s look at the tobacco industry for a little history that will shed light our how we receive our present information.
For years the tobacco industry was under fire…but they kept selling pack after pack of these killing sticks. How did they do it? Well, in 2004 during the congressional hearings, an email from a tobacco executive, in 1969 stated, “Doubt is our product since it is the best means of competing with the ‘body of fact’ that exists in the minds of the general public.” Needless to say, this concept has become our nation’s black eye. It’s in every (well almost) marketing ad, solution, concept, or social media. It has invaded Washington D.C.
Let’s get back to that article that I felt raised that word again….Doubt. Here I felt the journalist needed a great headline while taking advantage of the wording within the article; Below in “….” is the entire article:
“Dementia: Obesity, but not diet or inactivity, raises risk
A new, long-term study finds that midlife obesity raises the risk of dementia in women. However, calorie intake and physical inactivity do not.
Obesity in midlife may raise a woman’s risk of dementia later on, new research suggests.
Sarah Floud, Ph.D., of the Nuffield Department of Population Health at the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom, is the lead author of the study.
As Floud and her colleagues explain in their paper, some previous studies have found an association between a low body mass index (BMI) and the likelihood of receiving a diagnosis of dementia within the next 5–10 years.
Other studies that lasted a decade or less have also linked poor diet and lack of exercise with the incidence of dementia.
However, all of the above may be the result of reverse causality, meaning that they may be consequences, rather than causes, of dementia. This situation could well be possible, explain the authors, because dementia typically affects cognition a decade before the person formally receives a diagnosis.”
This type of presentation is 1. not factual, and even worse, 2. is misleading. And yet it may have been done quite innocently. The point is that this type of information is the Info Buzz that we are constantly receiving during our waking hours. Because we have so much social media, the key to get us to pay attention is to “HEY, get their attention!” And because we do not have the time to cross check the billions of pieces of Info Buzz we constantly receive….I doubt that every bit if information I get is true….which means I never know if any information is true or not.
Even as I was writing the last paragraph, I was getting confused. And suddenly, within the blink of an eye, everyone of us is getting tons of information….weather we need it or not. And it’s confusing…I doubt if everything is true….Ah! See, it’s happening right before our eyes….’I doubt if everything I hear is true’. As an old preacher use to say, The truth shall set you free.
Oh, BTW, obesity, caloric intact, and physical exercise all have an import impact on Dementia. Stay Healthy and Enjoy Life, Vegan Doc 12/26/2019
