June 2, 2015

“Psychologist Brian Nosek of the University of Virginia says that the most common and problematic bias in science is ‘motivated reasoning’: We interpret observations to fit a particular idea.

“Psychologists have shown that ‘most of our reasoning is in fact rationalization,’ he says. In other words, we have already made the decision about what to do or to think, and our ‘explanation’ of our reasoning is really a justification for doing what we wanted to do – or to believe – anyway.”

– From “The Trouble With Scientists: How one psychologist is tackling human biases in science” by Philip Ball at Nautilus (May 14)

“Motivated reasoning” ran amok during the “satanic ritual abuse” day-care panic, resulting in journal articles such as “Stress Responses of Children to Sexual Abuse and Ritualistic Abuse in Day Care Centers” and “Satanic Ritual Abuse: A Cause of Multiple Personality Disorder” – and legitimizing testimony by the prosecution’s expert witnesses.

Not surprisingly, Dr. Nosek has found examples of “motivated reasoning” in claims of recovered memory.

“In my intro psych course,” he told me, “I have one lecture that is centered around Lawrence Wright’s fascinating ‘Remembering Satan’….” (about a 1988 case in Olympia, Wash., involving not only SRA allegations but also false confession).

June 29, 2012

“One month after drawing national attention when she dismissed final charges involving the children at the day-care center, (Nancy Lamb) clings to her belief that Robert Kelly is a child molester….

“Still, she admits it’s not easy to explain why none of the defendants have turned against each other, even though they were offered deals by her office.

“ ‘You did have kind of a group dynamic going on where they did hang around together and support each other and encourage each other to hang tough,’ Lamb said.”

– From the Norfolk Virginian-Pilot, July 2, 1997

Aug. 16, 2013

“Ritual abuse may now seem an almost quaint aberration, a temporary fad that seized the popular imagination, as outdated as hula-hoops or disco fever. But our anxieties about children continue to affect our judgment. When a meta-analysis of research published in Psychological Bulletin (1998) suggested that not all children under the age of 18 were traumatized by having sexual experiences before adulthood, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a resolution condemning the association. Not surprisingly, the popular outcry that led to the Congressional resolution was sparked by talk show celebrity Laura Schlessinger.

“More recently, a book that explored whether overzealous response to fears about children and sexuality are harmful to the youth we seek to protect was published by the University of Minnesota press after trade publishers deemed it too controversial for their lists; Tim Pawlenty, then a state legislator, but who was elected governor of Minnesota in 2002, quickly moved to condemn the publication and the University for publishing it.”

– From “The Devil in the Details: Media Representation of ‘Ritual Abuse’ and Evaluation of Sources” by Barbara Fister in Studies in Media & Information Literacy Education (May 2003)

May 4, 2012

“Written reports that contain statements such as ‘The child said that Mr. Bob told them secrets’ are meaningless.

“We need to know whether this was a spontaneous remark, whether this was prompted by an open-ended question (e.g., “What did Mr. Bob tell you?”), or whether this is merely the interviewer’s memory of the gist of a conversation in which the interviewer asked, ‘Did Mr. Bob ask you to keep secrets?’ and the child reluctantly may have replied, ‘Yes.’

“Some summaries of the interviews are written in such a way as to make one believe that children made spontaneous and detailed statements about sexual abuse. However in the few instances where we have transcripts of other interviews, it is clear that the child only responded ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to a barrage of leading questions.”

– From “Jeopardy in the Courtroom: A Scientific Analysis of Children’s
Testimony” by Stephen J. Ceci and Maggie Bruck (1995)