10:07am February 6, 2012

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So, we have a group of individuals whose more factual descriptions of a meaningless picture were interpreted as insignificant and talkative. We have a group whose more accurate tactile matching was interpreted as sensory prediction deficits. And we have a group whose heightened memory discrimination in one study was interpreted as the result of an as-yet-unknown pathology, and whose equivalent performance in another study was interpreted as frontal executive impairment.

Confused? If I told you the group interpreted as providing insignificant and talkative descriptions comprised “normal females,” the group interpreted as unable to predict the sensory consequences of their actions comprised persons diagnosed with schizophrenia, and the group interpreted as having aberrant mental representations and frontal executive impairment comprised persons diagnosed with autism, would it help? It shouldn’t.

Maggio (1991) recommends that we test our writing for bias by substituting our own group for the group we are discussing. If we feel offended, then our writing is biased. I recommend that we test our interpretations for bias by peeling off the labels, as I’ve done here. If our interpretations make little sense, then our science is biased.

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