But I don't think they are trying to draw definitive conclusions from this - they are reporting what they found. And a 3x factor seems like something that deserves attention. I don't think that is "bad science".
Many important advances came from some one simply noticing something (penicillin, vulcanization of rubber, etc). We don't call that "bad science", we call it observation. Then the observation gets followed up with more studies and experiments. Plenty of room for bad science in all that, but I would not call this observation bad science, unless they weighted it beyond what you can draw from all the limitations of the data set. I don't see where they are doing that.
-ERD50
From the study
The researchers admitted to study limitations, including the observational nature of the data, the absence of ethnic minorities, and the use of a self-reported questionnaire to obtain dietary intake data, which may be subject to poor memory.”
It is a GARBAGE study, in my unscientific mind, designed to get I feel additional grant money for the author Sudha Seshadri, who appears to do little other than compile 10 year old stats and ask follow up questions 10 years later as the basis for a “10 year study” and choose outliers as “conclusions"
Now you may not know Sudha Seshadri but the professor was recently was the author of another “study” that claimed that being highly educated you have 1/6th the chance of getting alzheimers as compared to people without a high school degree when more than nine hours of sleep a night occur. And postulated that having a higher education might create a “reserve” of neurons that protects against dementia. All as a result of “studying” 234 cases of dementia. Again a “study” of 2400 in one small town in Massachusetts where they relied on self reporting to target how many developed dementia —234 developed dementia of which only a small portion could possibly have been “highly educated and sleeping more than 9 hours in a night” to reach that conclusion.
So this doctor takes a minimal amount of cases and finds the outliers and declares a study that has a great media hook and proclaims a need for additional funding and nationwide attention on the study as if it is a “fact” when there is not even a scientific basis for this. In both cases Sudha admits that actually the study is proof of nothing only the need for additonal studies and that water is better than diet soda so better safe than sorry. I think no studies are needed for that rather obvious conclusion
Or perhaps her “study” in 2010 of 773 people that showed people with pot bellies are more likely to develop dementia. Of this group 69 developed dementia
Our data suggests a stronger connection between central obesity . . . and risk of dementia and Alzheimer's disease,' said Sudha Seshadri, from Boston University School of Medicine, leader of the study published in the journal Annals of Neurology.
Of course this is offset by a 2016 “study” that claims worldwide dementia rates are declinging because of……. weight gain!
Carrying excess pounds generally raises the risk of diabetes and heart disease, which are thought to increase the risk of dementia, but “late-life obesity may be protective,” wrote commentary authors Ozioma C. Okonkwo and Dr. Sanjay Asthana of the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health. T
Not to worry ---as a result of decades of working on these ground breaking studies Sadhra was recently awarded 20 million to continue the understanding of the causes of dementia. Probably another 2000 people in Farmington will be able to earn a little money being “studied” by filling out questionaires for the next 10 years. And in the interim “studies” showing popular activities or obvious health risks will have been “determined” to cause dementia in future breathtaking media stories and internet stories.
I find this career of preparing “studies” of statistical anomalies no more compelling than if she had written down gambling results of roulette players over 200 spins of a roulette wheel and determine that since the group that came up showing 4 times more losses than average had reported drinking a diet coke a day— leads to publication of a “study” that drinking of diet soda leads to 4 times more losses than those that do not drink diet soda. And then asking for millions to do a more in depth study of the roulette wheel diet soda drinkers as the actual results are only “observations” and that gambling losses could best be mitigated by drinking water when playing roulette.
