Beard research

Last week I ran in to two different studies about beards.  This was interesting, as it's not normally a hot topic in academia.  

My Dad has a beard, and except for two brief occasions, has had one my entire life.  Thus I was interested to see that beards might actually help keep you young.  Apparently the block UV rays from getting to your skin and help prevent skin damage.  My only question would be if this helps your whole face or just the part covered by the beard (Dad you could be like 23 under there!)

Second, there was this report on two studies where researchers tried to find out which type of facial hair women found most attractive.  Apparently it's stubble.  The study that ruled out beards apparently took women from cultures where men did not traditionally wear beards (Somoan/Polynesian) and showed them pictures of men clean shaven, and pictures of the same men after 6 weeks of growth.  The rated clean shaven more highly.

Studies that focus on attractiveness levels like that are always a little strange to me, especially with something like facial hair.  While having a control group is good for a study, most people do not choose their facial hair style at random...they go for what they're comfortable with/what looks good on them.  Some men can rock a beard, some look goofy.  There's a context here that a controlled study misses.  

Also, beards not trimmed for 6 weeks are gross.  I've seen sports teams during winning streaks.  Things get yucky in a hurry.  

While we're on the topic, apparently there's a website called Awesome Beards.  Enjoy!

Saturday Fun Links 5-11-13

Would you care to ponder your place in time and space?  Here's a good visualization.

As for space, I have my favorite new game.  It's called Geo Guesser.  It gives you a random picture of a spot somewhere in the world, and you have to guess where it is.  The closest I've been is 1800 km off.  My high score is 7329.

If that games got you tripped up, explore your neighborhood while running away from zombies here.

Speaking of geography, check out this infographic on which state employee makes the most money in each state.  Spoiler alert: it's coaches.  But who should be the best paid?  Jonathan suggests the state house tour guides.  I like that.

Hey, it's my first Mother's Day!  Husband's out of town on business, so I'm spending the day babysitting (can you still call it that when he's yours?)  Anyway, here are some animal moms that deserve a break.

Oh, and a very happy graduation day to my little sister who's getting her bachelors of nursing today!  Your patients are lucky to have you!

Details details

I have some fun links for later in the day, but looking at the news this morning I wanted to ponder something that's truly bugging me.

I've been reading about the "happy they were found but horrible it happened" situation in Cleveland (if you don't know what I'm talking about, try here, but not if you don't want your day wrecked).  When I first read about it, I was horrified, as I think most people were.  At the time the story broke, I took a look in the comments section, and I was really surprised to see how many people latched on to wildly speculative details that have turned out to be incorrect.  

Why do people still do this?

In the age of the internet every major story that breaks suddenly has severe factual inaccuracies reported in the first 24-48 hours.  It happens over and over again, and yet there are still people dedicating time and keyboard space to long screeds about whatever unconfirmed detail they think is relevant.  

Is it really so hard to just say "that's awful" for the first 2 days until the facts start coming in?  

Wednesday brain teaser 5-8-13

8898=7

4566=2

1203=1

2313=0

4566=2

5464=1

7774=0

1003=2

9856=4

9955=2

1886=5

1231=0

8764=3

4500= ?

If you're stumped, here's a hint: an average five year old could get the answer....quite possibly more quickly than an adult could.

Generally specific

In my post yesterday, I cited a Gallup Poll that asked people "What do you think is the most important problem facing this country today?"

I was intrigued when I noticed that the top answer was "the economy in general".  Other top answers included unemployment, the deficit, lack of money, poverty and taxes.  This interested me because if I told you I was concerned about the economy, I would have been talking about all of those things.  I decided to take a closer look at the methodology for the survey (it's a PDF at the bottom of the link above) and found that apparently this question is open ended, and then the results are grouped from there.

I thought this was interesting, because asking people like this lends itself to people getting general on you, with words that they have their own meaning for.  Someone worried about the economy could mean mostly unemployment, or mostly the deficit, or any combination of things.

This problem arises in polls with pre-programmed answers too.  People tend to gravitate towards the biggest possible categories when asked to pick a top concern.  It's good to remember this when hearing reports on what people care about.  It's always a good idea to look at the other options and see if their categories were more limiting.  We like to keep our options open.

Background checks...can I see some ID?

Last week I did a set of polls where I asked readers to weigh in on how old they defined "young" as in various situations.  The answers didn't totally surprise me...support for "youngness" seems to begin to drop when you hit 18 and peter out by the time you hit 30 or 35.

What triggered the question to begin with was a link someone put up on facebook to a letter from a young conservative girl about gun control.  When I read the headline, I had been thinking that this "young girl" was going to be 15 or 16, maybe a college student at the most.  I took a look at the picture accompanying the article and was interested that the woman pictured looked a bit older than I had thought.  I did a little digging, and from the best I can tell, the author (Katie Kieffer) seems to be about 30*.

It's a little nit-picky, I know, but I'm 31 and if someone under 80 or so called me a "young girl" I'd be surprised.  My theory is that politics is dominated by older people, and thus people are described as young for longer than in everyday life.  Just a theory.

Anyway, what really caught my eye about her article was what she labeled "Obama Lie #1":

Obama Lie #1: “90 percent of Americans” support the Manchin-Toomey bill for extended background checks.
False. According to the latest Gallup Poll, just 4 percent of Americans think that guns/gun control is the most important issue facing our country. That means 96 percent of Americans are NOT worried about this issue and would not support increased gun control, especially if they knew the truth about background checks. Dr. John Lott has shown that: “There is no real scientific evidence among criminologists and economists that background checks actually reduce crime.”

Now honestly, I grew up in New Hampshire.  I think I was 9 the first time I fired a gun.  I find it relaxing. I'm not big on laws I see as reactionary that lack evidence to back up their methods. But characterizing this as a lie?  That seems a bit much.

For the first part: the Washington Post/ABC poll did, in fact, find that 90% of people agreed with expanding background checks to gun shows.  The Pew research center put it at 85%.   Now there are definitely details you could use to protest this: Obama actually said 90% support universal background checks, and these asked about gun show background checks...different wording could cause different answers.  Different polls find different numbers, 90% is on the high side, etc.  At the end of the day though, there are legitimate polls showing high support for background checks at gun shows.

What truly baffled me was her assertion that "96% of Americans are NOT worried about this issue and would not support increase gun control".  I looked up the Gallup Poll she cited and found that the exact question asked was "What do you think the most important problem facing this country today?".  It's true that only 4% listed guns, but I'm pretty sure no one thought that classifying one of these issue as "most important" was saying that they wouldn't support any action on any of the other things on the list.   Other things that scored lower than guns: ethics and moral decline, education, taxes and immigration.  I'm sure everyone will be thrilled to know we don't need to talk about those any more

In conclusion, I think Obama quoted the poll with a fair degree of accuracy.  Results of a different poll with a completely different question don't actually make that in to a lie.

It's a pity because her last statement, about a lack of evidence that background checks work, actually has some credibility.  It looks like the biggest point of impact is actually suicides in those 55+, but not much on homicides.


*Her bio lists that she started the St Thomas Standard in her sophomore year of college, when most people are about 20.  The St Thomas Standard lists their founding date as 2003.  

Small but quantifiable

There's been a few interesting headlines about the dangers of swaddling babies.

I always find these types of stories interesting...essentially you have a practice for children called in to question because someone did it in the wrong way/with the wrong age group*, and then the headlines act like the whole practice is questionable.  Sigh.

Here's the thing:  swaddling (wrapping babies up snugly in a blanket) is safe if done right.  I did it, and stopped between 2 and 3 months old when the little lord got too wiggly.  For a newborn though, it calms them down.  This makes sense...they spent 9 months in a snug environment, and it makes them feel safe.  If you know anyone having a baby, get them these.  They do the work for you.  They're awesome.

Anyway, there apparently are some people questioning whether this practice should stop being recommended because if you do it wrong or for too long, it's bad.  I think this is a great example of letting a small but quantifiable risk (ie the risk of SIDS) trump a larger but less quantifiable risk.

Babies who aren't swaddled don't calm as easily or sleep as well...or at least mine didn't (and I hear I'm not alone).  Parents who have screaming awake babies get tired and frustrated.  How many car accidents would be caused by sleepy parents?  Injury to the child due to inattention?  Cases of shaken baby syndrome because the child wouldn't sleep?  This would be impossible to measure, but the risks of having a newborn who doesn't sleep well are very very real.  After all, this (admittedly small) study found that 70% of mothers of colicky infants have fantasized explicitly about harming their child....at that point the risk of SIDS is far smaller than the risk of the mother not getting any sleep.

I get the seduction of prioritizing those things which are easily measured, but we should never lose sight of what's less measurable....now I think I'm gonna go get some sleep!

*In this case they managed to swaddle a 7 month old and a 1 year old.  I can barely get a diaper on my 9 month old....I have no idea how they swaddled them.