WEIRD Studies Flawed
UBC professors are pointing out the flawed scientific practices of many psychology researchers, as was described in the Globe and Mail, Science, the Chronicle of Higher Education and the Vancouver Sun.
Most psychology studies are based on a small sample of university students — people from western, educated, industrialized, rich, and democratic (WEIRD) societies — and does not necessarily represent the bulk of humanity.
“While students from Western nations are a convenient, low cost data pool, our findings suggest that they are also among the least representative populations one could find for generalizing about humans,” said Joseph Henrich, a UBC professor of psychology and economics, who worked on the study with colleagues Steven Heine and Ara Norenzayan.
UBC Students Nab Emmy Nomination
Ten UBC students and their professor Peter Klein have been nominated for two Emmy Awards for their documentary, Ghana: Digital Dumping Ground.
The Globe and Mail, the Canadian Press, CBC, CTV, the Vancouver Sun and others have reported on the nominations for the film that traced the path of electronic waste around the globe.
“The nominations themselves are great, but the idea that the students are recognized for this kind of work is amazing,” said Klein, a former 60 Minutes producer who has previously won two Emmys.
“It was great as a learning experience. We never expected to make something that would be nominated for an Emmy,” said Dan Haves, one of the students who worked on the documentary.
Study on Homestay Students
Compared with immigrant or Canadian-born Asian students, UBC researchers have found that homestay students in B.C. are more sexually active, likely to skip school, take cocaine and binge-drink. Nearly a quarter of homestay girls also reported being sexually abused, versus nine per cent of their Canadian peers.
Agence France Presse, The Korea Times, the Globe and Mail, CTV, Postmedia News and others reported on the study which called for government oversight of homestays.
“There’s no policies, there’s no regulation, there’s no standards, there’s no reporting,” said lead author assoc. Prof. Sabrina Wong.
The Math (and Morality) of Giving
The San Francisco Chronicle, Bloomberg Businessweek, the Vancouver Sun and others reported on research by UBC psychology professor Elizabeth Dunn that suggests spending money on others makes us happier.
Dunn and her team gave subjects $10 and asked them to decide how much to keep for themselves and how much to give away.
“The more they give away, the more positive emotions they feel,” she said of the subjects. “Conversely, the more money they keep for themselves, the more shame they feel.”
Research Shows Substantive Drop in HIV Transmission
A new study, presented by UBC’s Julio Montaner at the 18th International AIDS Society Conference in Vienna, suggests that increasing the number of HIV patients who receive highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) leads to a decline in the spread of the virus that causes AIDS.
“Our results should serve to re-energize the G8’s universal access pledge as a means to curb the effect of AIDS and the growth of the HIV pandemic,” said Montaner, the chair in AIDS Research at UBC’s Faculty of Medicine, and president of the IAS.
Science, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the Globe and Mail, the National Post, the Toronto Star and others picked up on the study results and Montaner’s talk at the conference.
