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Autism Vox

A Lot of Knowledge Can Be a Harmful Thing

by Kristina Chew, PhD on March 15th, 2008

It’s “highly educated parents” who are more likely not to have their children vaccinated with the MMR shot, today’s Daily Mail reports. So what kind of “education” are they getting, or following—-maybe an overdose of the course offerings on Google U?

Tags: asd, asperger, autism, Health, measles, mercury, mmr, Parenting, pdd-nos, shots, Vaccines

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Daisy
Mar 15, 2008 at 2:54 pm

Really? That surprises and disappoints me. I’d rather hear that highly educated parents are more likely to read the science, not the pseudo-science, and act on the reality, not the myth. Darn.
Danni
Mar 15, 2008 at 3:14 pm

Ignoring the fact this is from the Daily Mail, this doesn’t surprise me. Higher educated people are more likely to be up to date with the news and take an interest in the sort of scare stories that crop up. When I lived in a very poor, run down area of Liverpool, I’d have been surprised if half of the parents in my street were even aware of the whole MMR causes autism scare, let alone caring enough about it to not get the MMR. They had more important things to worry about.
Marla
Mar 15, 2008 at 3:18 pm

That is just ridiculous. How do they judge this? What do they consider more educated? Most people we know who have chosen not to use the vaccines….ooops…I will not say any more. It is really silly to even make judgments in this area. It probably does more harm than good.
Kristina Chew, PhD
Mar 15, 2008 at 3:56 pm

There was an article in Babble last year about (I think) women who are doctors, lawyers, etc. deciding to stay home and raise their children. One woman quoted was a doctor who noted that she especially made sure to do her research and ask hard questions to pediatricians about (you guessed it) vaccines.
dkmnow
Mar 15, 2008 at 4:06 pm

I, for one, am not going to ignore the fact that this comes from the Daily Mail. The pedestrian sensationalism surrounding the vaccine scare is exactly the sort of thing that passes for “education” in their view of the world.

[*makes mental note to re-read Manufacturing Consent*]
Bink
Mar 15, 2008 at 4:35 pm

In the latest issue of Brain, Child magazine that I got last week, they discuss the high income level and high educational level of their readers, and… the cover article is about vaccine safety. In the end the “scientist mom” author comes down on the side of vaccinating, but is clearly dubious and in the article it says the “science is still out.” Oh, and, heads up, it’s the aluminum that’s the issue being worried about now. Not the mercury. Dr. Sears says so. Take note.

Oh and there’s a DAN ad.

I’m cancelling my subscription.
Bad mommy
Mar 15, 2008 at 4:37 pm

Those “educated” mothers I know wouldn’t dream of leaving their kids unvaccinated. I’ve got two advanced degrees, and used to be in a sewing circle of a bunch of women with PhDs (it was a pretty funny bunch sitting around quilting) and none of us would have dreamed of not vaccinating our children. Thing is, one of the daffiest, silliest women I’ve ever met was in that group. A PhD in chemistry doing research at a major university. Very credulous person. I suppose there is a major disconnect between education and common sense.
shawng3k
Mar 15, 2008 at 5:59 pm

Common sense and education do not always go together, that is true. Lack of common sense is universal it seems. I think in part, because it is easier for some to place the blame on the current boogie man of the moment, than face the uncomfortable possibility that our own genetics are at fault (and the underlying “guilt” that it may cause).
David N. Andrews M. Ed. (Distinction)
Mar 15, 2008 at 6:28 pm

I’m not sure it’s the ‘lot of learning/knowledge’ - and those are two different things) - that messes things up. It’s more likely to be the fact that there’s often a disconnect between the material learned and the application of the skills used in learning that material in real life settings.
brstpathdoc
Mar 15, 2008 at 7:36 pm

This sounds like the inverse corollary of Pope’s “a little learning is a dangerous thing.” Maybe these represent the polar ends of a bell curve. Kristina, this is a golden opportunity to script a modern epic, The Vaciniad. Jennifer McCarthy would be a wonderful Dulness, whose mission is to convert all the world to stupidity.
Regan
Mar 15, 2008 at 7:44 pm

One demographic that I heard was was most likely to opt out of vaccination was
white, married, some college/college educated and making more than $75,000 a year.
I don’t think that they surveyed whether the college education was beyond a bachelor’s degree, although among those with medical training, those with alternative medicine training tended to opt out above those with conventional training.

My husband has a Ph.D. in physics and even he says that a “highly educated” person can be as dumb as the next guy once you take him out of the field that the training was in.

I know quite a few very intelligent people who believe complete pseudoscience, not limited to vaccination. I think it’s a placebo effect and since they don’t encounter a negative reaction or dismiss it when they do, there seems to be a strong psychological factor involved.
It’s my opinion that are at a time when very few people have first-hand experience with serious contagious disease so the perception of risk with vaccines is emphasized.

I hate to completely diss “Google U” since the internet does allow access to good information (getting pdfs beats the delay dragging journal articles out of the academic library); the problem is that misinformation travels equally fast and people do not always have the background to discriminate the gold from the garbage (something one of the scientist-fathers of the internet ruefully noted). It’s like blaming the tool for being misused.
Kristina Chew, PhD
Mar 15, 2008 at 8:04 pm

That would be “blaming the messenger” (or the medium…..).

brpathdoc, I guess a “Jenniad” would give her too much credit. Am now tapping out the meter for various terms: Safe-Minds, vaccines (spondee); it’s not thimerosal (2 dactyls)……
David N. Andrews M. Ed. (Distinction)
Mar 15, 2008 at 9:39 pm

“My husband has a Ph.D. in physics and even he says that a “highly educated” person can be as dumb as the next guy once you take him out of the field that the training was in.”

This is the phenomenon I was talking about: the lack of transferable skills… or more like the non-transfer of such skills into ordinary life.

“It’s my opinion that are at a time when very few people have first-hand experience with serious contagious disease so the perception of risk with vaccines is emphasized.”

I think you’re right… and this has a name - the availability heuristic.
A Personal Matter
Mar 21, 2008 at 2:17 am

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