Quiz: Which of these studies were real and which ones are fakes?

At least one of the three studies described briefly below was a real study, published in a reputable, peer-reviewed medical journal. Let’s see if you can identify which of these studies were real and which one(s) are fake.

Study no. 1

A published study systematically evaluated a sample of 200 adolescents from 4 urban schools for nose-picking.

– Almost the entire sample admitted to nose-picking.

– The median frequency of nose-picking was 4 times per day. And, the frequency was more than 20 times per day in about 8% of the adolescents studied. That’s a lot!

– Nearly 17% of the subjects felt that their nose-picking was a serious problem. That is a lot!

– The authors took the analyses very seriously. Several interesting findings in specific categories of nose pickers were identified.

What do you think? Was this a real study, published in a peer-reviewed journal, or this a fake, made-up study?

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Study no. 2

A study used data mining of electronic medical records to evaluate a possible association between cat bites and depression in humans. They used administrative diagnosis codes on 1.3 million patients to identify patients with either depression or cat bites.

Then, for all patients who had a diagnosis code for an animal bite, they manually reviewed the charts in the electronic health record to determine whether the bites were from a cat or a dog.

– Of these 1.3 million patients, approximately 117,000 patients had a diagnosis of clinical depression, 750 had had cat bites, and 108 had had dog bites.

– Here is the main findingof this study: Of those who had been bitten by a cat, 41.3% also had a diagnosis of depression, while, of those who had been bitten by a dog, 28.7% also had a diagnosis of depression.

– Of those with a history of both a cat bite and depression, 85.5% were women, while a lower percentage (64.5%) of those with a history of both a dog bite and depression were women.

– Here is the key recommendation from the study: The authors concluded that the high incidence of depression in patients who had cat bites, especially among women, suggested that patients who present with a cat bite should be screened for depression.

– They also recommended that, given the growing evidence of the relationship between cats and human mental illness, such as depression, this issue should be investigated further.

What do you think? Was this a real study, published in a peer-reviewed journal, or this a fake, made-up study?

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Study no. 3

When a supervisor is abusive towards a subordinate, it is natural for the subordinate to want to retaliate. Retaliation is considered dysfunctional but retaliating may reduce the subordinate’s perception of injustice.

So, a group of researchers did an experiment in which they found that symbolic retaliation by harming a voodoo doll that represented the supervisor who had been abusive was helpful to the subordinates who had been abused; it reduced their perceptions of injustice.

What do you think? Was this a real study, published in a peer-reviewed journal, or this a fake, made-up study?

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Now, click on the link below to see the correct answers—which ones were real and which ones are fakes.

https://simpleandpractical.com/real-fake-studies/