Separating the Good From the Eh… Evaluating information Sources

The good news is, there is sooo much info to be found on the internet that relates to attachment parenting issues. The bad news is, there is sooo much info to be found on the internet that relates to attachment parenting issues! What's a parent to do?

First of all when evaluating sources of information you want to consider the source. I know, I know! A no brainer yes, but let's take it a step further.

Most of the information that can be found that relates to parenting, baby, families and the like can be put into a few loose categories which are classified by the way potentially relevant information is conveyed to you. I'm probably forgetting some but these are the major ones off the top of my head:

Personal/collective account

Poll/survey

gathered information

news or magazine article

statistical data based on research

Without trying to get too deep into an essay on the finer points of logic and fallacious arguments I will just try to briefly touch on the pros and cons of each type of source.

Personal and collective accounts of parenting issues are the ones I run into the most. Examples of these expressions of information can be found in blog entries and yahoo groups, message boards, etc. Although this is an easy way to glean some quick and general information this should only be a starting point. Not to overstate the obvious but you know, something that happened to a particular person has varying degree of relevance to you. There are always some overt or hidden variables between yourself and the person or people, which makes this a bad way pertain information to yourself.

Polls and surveys, especially informal ones, are always somewhat flawed. They are good in a sense that you can get an idea of what the consensus is within a defined group, but you can never get an accurate outcome in the sense that when you take a poll you are getting information from a select group of people (people who like to, or take the time to be answer a poll or survey) For example, say a message board is conduction a survey of how many of their members have children with disabilities. Their final tally may not include the answers of the message board members who; were too busy to take the poll, were not online that day, did not care to answer, answered but lied in the poll, did not fully understand the question, etc. In scientific research self reporting like this is generally deemed unreliable.

Gathered information can be anything from a friend telling you about a study she heard on the news to a website or blog dedicated to provide info on a subject. This type of source can be good or bad depending on several factors. Most important of these are reliability, how much do you trust the source providing the info to share an unbiased and reliable account of the information? Is there an agenda (a website trying to scare you into buying a product maybe?) Are the sources of the info given to you? How "secondhand" is the knowledge when it is reported? Secondhand "facts" can be as jumbled as the secret in a game of post office by the time they reach you!

Again depending on the source, news and magazine articles can be a very good place to get info or very bad. A good indicator of the former can be if the article in question states clearly a source of their info. that you can follow up on. Example; "Dr's Sampson and Johnson published groundbreaking findings in the field of cryogenics in The Journal of American Medicine earlier this year stating that…" is much easier to follow up on than "Two renowned scientists in the field of cryogenics discovered that…"

We also can't forget a major flaw with all of the sources discussed so far: Personal agenda, human error and ego have a way of tainting the resulting data that gets to you.

The final source of information, statistical data is the surest way to know what you really need to know. The CDC and WHO websites are two dependable & insightful sources for this type of research, just off the top of my head. Trying to glean insight from statistical data has it's drawbacks as well.

1. You should have a basic knowledge of statistics to fully understand what's going on. The numbers cannot lie. Very true BUT people misrepresent this type of data to the unsuspecting every day!
   
2. This type of info is more difficult to come by. How many pro- breastfeeding websites can you name right now? How many sources of statistical data regarding the proven benefits breastfeeding though???
   
3. Bottom line- it's more work on your part
   

But come on, it's really not that bad :P

A pretty straightforward explanation of the terminology can be found here

http://www.statsoft.com/textbook/stathome.html

Basically you just need to know why the researchers tested the way that they did to get the results that they did, that's all. The cool thing (okay maybe I'm letting my geeky side show just a bit too much here) is that you'll start seeing a bunch of misleading statistical data, or references to it, or hear general statements alluding to general statistical data (especially in advertising read: commercials) that will make you do a double take and say "Heyyyy!"

So just try it! The link above is a good place to start but you can always google statistics or get an old textbook from the Salvation Army. I'm not saying you have to get down & start formulating equations, I'm not gonna check your homework or anything; you just need to get the gist of it. One day you'll be glad you did!