After critically thinking about the last blog entry I came to the conclusion that "Diet" is not a feasible New Year's resolution for me. In contrast, I might just start eating chocolate!
A 2012 study published in the New England Journal of Medicine could make the naïve reader believe
that all it takes to win a Nobel Prize is to
eat more chocolate [1]. The article makes its claims by reporting a
correlation between the average chocolate consumption (kg/person/year)
of a country and the number of Nobel Laureates the country has produced
(per 10 million inhabitants, to correct for population size). The idea
stems from previous findings showing that dietary flavanols present in
cocoa, red wine, and green tea improve cognitive function and slow down
the decline in cognitive performance that occurs with aging [2,3].
The paper, referred to as a “statistical misadventure”, has some serious problems with its logic, a major issue being “ecological fallacy”. The chocolate consumption data is based on the aggregate of a country. Thus, it is impossible to know whether the higher consumption actually occurs in those exhibiting higher cognitive function, let alone Nobel laureates. For all we know, the laureates could have even been allergic to chocolate!
Secondly, rare events like being awarded a Nobel Prize cannot be used as a metric of country-wide cognition. The correlation becomes insignificant when per capita income, a predictor of the consumption of luxury goods, is controlled for. And the biggest problem with the analysis is that the number of laureates could be correlated to almost any variable that increased with income like higher educational spending and even luxury car ownership [4]! Finally, let's not forget that the author considered the number of laureates from 1900 to 2011, whereas chocolate consumption data covered only four years starting after 2002. This just shows that anything can turn significant with bad statistics!
So, is the new recipe to win a Nobel Prize eating more chocolate? Probably not! But did you ever eat chocolate with the aim of winning a Nobel Prize anyway?
[1] Messerli, N Engl J Med, 2012
[2] Nurk E et al, J Nutr, 2009
[3] Desideri G et al, Hypertension, 2012
[4] http://bit.ly/1LIAJ74
by Apoorva Rajiv Madipakkam, PhD Student AG Sterzer
This article originally appeared September 2015 in Volume 08 Issue 3 "Food for Thought"
A 2012 study published in the New England Journal of Medicine could make the naïve reader believe
 |
| via pixabay |
NUMBER OF NOBELS
CORRELATES WITH
VARIABLES THAT INCREASE WITH INCOME
The paper, referred to as a “statistical misadventure”, has some serious problems with its logic, a major issue being “ecological fallacy”. The chocolate consumption data is based on the aggregate of a country. Thus, it is impossible to know whether the higher consumption actually occurs in those exhibiting higher cognitive function, let alone Nobel laureates. For all we know, the laureates could have even been allergic to chocolate!
Secondly, rare events like being awarded a Nobel Prize cannot be used as a metric of country-wide cognition. The correlation becomes insignificant when per capita income, a predictor of the consumption of luxury goods, is controlled for. And the biggest problem with the analysis is that the number of laureates could be correlated to almost any variable that increased with income like higher educational spending and even luxury car ownership [4]! Finally, let's not forget that the author considered the number of laureates from 1900 to 2011, whereas chocolate consumption data covered only four years starting after 2002. This just shows that anything can turn significant with bad statistics!
So, is the new recipe to win a Nobel Prize eating more chocolate? Probably not! But did you ever eat chocolate with the aim of winning a Nobel Prize anyway?
[1] Messerli, N Engl J Med, 2012
[2] Nurk E et al, J Nutr, 2009
[3] Desideri G et al, Hypertension, 2012
[4] http://bit.ly/1LIAJ74
by Apoorva Rajiv Madipakkam, PhD Student AG Sterzer
This article originally appeared September 2015 in Volume 08 Issue 3 "Food for Thought"
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