The Studies Show Tom Chivers and Stuart Ritchie

The criminal justice system and science are both broadly looking for the same thing - the truth. But in many cases the two don’t mix well. Whether it’s court cases that attempt to decide the truth of a scientific dispute, or the use of fingerprints, DNA, or statistics by the prosecution in a murder case, a lot can go wrong - and there’s a lot at stake.
Inspired by the recent discussion, or perhaps lack of discussion, around [a criminal case nobody in the UK can talk about for legal reasons], Tom and Stuart spend this episode looking into what happens when science meets the law.
Our favourite online magazine is Works in Progress - so it’s particularly pleasing that they’re the sponsors of The Studies Show. Works in Progress publish in-depth essays on underrated ideas to improve the world, covering the history and future of science and technology. Go to worksinprogress.co to read their entire archive for free.
Show notes
* UK man arrested for airport-related joke (2010); UK man arrested and punished (narrowly avoiding prison) for saying “burn auld fella, buuuuurn” upon the death of “Captain Tom” (2022)
* Simon Singh successfully sued by chiropractors (but then successfully appeals; 2010)
* Paper on the Italian criminal cases that helped fuel the anti-vaccine movement
* Jim Carrey campaigns against vaccines
* Tom’s 2018 New Scientist article on glyphosate and cancer
* 1995 article on the “phantom risks” of breast implants
* Helen Joyce on the Sally Clark case
* Tom’s 2024 Unherd article on “the dangers of trial by statistics”
* 2022 Royal Statistical Society report on the same topic
* How Bayes-savvy statisticians helped overturn Lucia de Berk’s conviction
* Gerd Gigerenzer on OJ Simpson
* 2022 philosophy paper on the issues with forensic science
* 2016 White House report on the gaps in forensic science
* Dror & Hampikian (2011) study on bias in DNA interpretation
* 2009 “Texas sharpshooter” paper on the rarity (or not) of DNA matches
* Useful 2023 review of human factors research in forensic science
* Interviews with 150 forensic examiners on potential biases in their work
Credits
The Studies Show is produced by Julian Mayers at Yada Yada Productions.


This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.thestudiesshowpod.com/subscribe

To be addicted to something, you’ve got to… er, actually, what does it mean to be “addicted” to something? We all agree you can be addicted to heroin, but can you also be addicted to videogames, or sex, or listening to podcasts?
And actually, it turns out we don’t all agree you can be addicted to heroin - or, at least, people have very different models of what that means. In what is effectively an hour-long clarification of a throwaway comment in a previous episode, Tom and Stuart talk through the various aspects of addiction, and try to pin down the scientific definition of what turns out to be a strangely elusive concept.
The Studies Show is brought to you by Works in Progress magazine, whose recent issue covers its usual mix of science, technology, and policy ideas to help with human flourishing. Read deeply-researched articles about prediction markets, gentrification, concrete, and drink-driving policy at worksinprogress.co.
Show notes
* Addiction: A Very Short Introduction, by Keith Humphries
* And his Atlantic article on how de-stigmatising drugs could be a mistake
* Unlocked: The Real Science of Screen Time (and How to Spend it Better) by Pete Etchells
* Scotland’s unbelievably bad drug problem in one graph
* Theodore Dalrymple on Samuel Taylor Coleridge
* And another historical case: The Rugeley Poisoner
* US physician referring to addiction as a “disease” in 1874
* And a German physician discusses “morbid craving” for morphine in 1875
* Made-up Victorian theories on the cause of addiction
* Useful Vaughan Bell article on “the unsexy truth” about dopamine
* Evidence that Parkinson’s patients still experience pleasure despite low dopamine levels
* Evidence that a majority of (UK) smokers want to quit
* The CAGE screening questionnaire for alcohol disorders
* On the 1980 letter cited in and discussed in Dopesick
* Marc Lewis’s Memoirs of an Addicted Brain
* A discussion and critique of the “Rat Park” experiments
* Paper on “Addictive Symptoms of Mukbang Watching” (this is real!)
* The jokey origins of “Internet Use Disorder”
Credits
The Studies Show is produced by Julian Mayers at Yada Yada Productions.


This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.thestudiesshowpod.com/subscribe

Should you avoid giving your child peanuts to ensure they don’t develop an allergy? If you’d asked medical authorities this question in the late 90s and early 2000s, you’d get an answer that’s completely opposite to what you’d get now.
In this episode of The Studies Show, Tom and Stuart discuss the science behind the medical recommendations on peanut allergy - the remarkable story of a major scientific U-turn.
The Studies Show is sponsored by Works in Progress magazine. Their latest article, about “advance market commitments” for vaccines and antibiotics and other stuff besides, is now available at worksinprogress.co.
Show notes
* Useful review article on the “diagnosis and management of food allergy”
* Analysis of UK NHS data on hospitalisations and mortality from anaphylaxis
* Two studies raising doubts about parents’ claims that their child has an allergy
* Recommendations on improving tests for food allergy
* 1998 UK Department of Health document recommending not to give children peanuts until 3 years of age
* 2000 American Academy of Pediatrics statement that broadly agrees
* Stuart’s 2023 i article on the controversy
* 2008 observational study comparing Jewish children in the UK (no peanuts) to Jewish children in Israel (lots of peanuts)
* …after which the advice in the UK is announced to be “suspended”
* The 2015 LEAP randomised controlled trial on peanut avoidance vs. peanut consumption in infants
* Follow-up of the same data to age 12
* BBC article about the follow-up
* Observational study from Australia finding no significant change in the prevalence of peanut allergy
* Paper arguing that if we want to see effects, we need to give peanuts to babies even earlier
* The EAT trial of food allergen exposure in non-high-risk infants
* Re-analysis of LEAP and EAT data to work out the best age to administer peanuts
* The PreventADALL study from Sweden
* 2019 article collecting examples of “medical reversals” from across the scientific literature
Credits
The Studies Show is produced by Julian Mayers at Yada Yada Productions.


This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.thestudiesshowpod.com/subscribe

Many Western countries, most notably the US, had a major decline in their crime rate in the 1990s. About 20 years earlier, the US had banned the use of lead in gasoline. Perhaps you wouldn’t think those two facts are related - but many researchers think this wasn’t a coincidence.
After getting distracted and doing a whole episode on lead and IQ a couple of weeks ago, Tom and Stuart get to the subject they intended to cover: the lead-crime hypothesis. How strong is the evidence that the presence of lead in a child’s early environment increases their propensity for crime when they grow up? And how strong is the evidence that lead removal (at least partly) caused the declining crime rate?
The Studies Show is brought to you by Works in Progress, the magazine full of new and underrated ideas for advancing science, technology, and humanity. They have a new issue out right now, which opens with a fascinating essay on the decline of drink-driving. Check it out at worksinprogress.co.
Show notes
* Numbers on the US crime rate over time
* Evidence from Finland on IQ and crime
* The first study (to our knowledge) on the lead-crime hypothesis, from 2007
* Rob Verbruggen’s 2021 Manhattan Institute report on lead and crime
* Jennifer Doleac’s 2021 Niskanen Center report on lead and crime
* Paper focusing on 1920s/30s America and the impact of lead on crime
* 2020 Swedish paper on moss lead levels and crime
* 2021 PNAS paper on lead and personality change
* 2022 meta-analysis on the lead-crime hypothesis
* 2023 systematic review on the same topic
Credits
The Studies Show is produced by Julian Mayers at Yada Yada Productions.


This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.thestudiesshowpod.com/subscribe

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Johann Hari is a journalist with an interesting past who has now written four very popular books on scientific topics (addiction, depression, attention, and obesity). Are those books any good?
In this paid-subscriber-only episode of The Studies Show, Tom and Stuart—who have both written reviews of Hari’s books—discuss Hari’s career, his sudden emergence as a science writer, and exactly how many miles you need to travel around the world to ensure your book becomes a New York Times bestseller.

Petrol, pipes, paint: they made a whole generation duller. That’s if you believe the research on the effects of lead on IQ. By interfering with neurological development, the lead that we used to encounter routinely has left hundreds of millions of us with a tiny bit of brain damage.
In this episode of The Studies Show, Tom and Stuart look at the toxic effects of lead - from very obvious, high-dose lead poisoning to the more insidious, low-level effects that have apparently held millions of people back. How strong is the evidence for the effects of low-level lead exposure on IQ?
The Studies Show is brought to you by Works in Progress magazine, a journal of ideas to accelerate human progress. If you’re a student aged 18-22 and want to attend the Works in Progress “Invisible College” this August (at which Stuart is speaking), take a look at this link.
Show Notes
* Centers for Disease Control (CDC) page on lead poisoning
* Articles on the history of lead poisoning from the BBC and the Guardian
* 2022 PNAS study concluding that “half of US population exposed to adverse lead levels in early childhood” (the one with the “824,097,690” figure)
* Article on blood lead levels and which are considered dangerous
* The 2005 meta-analysis on lead and children’s IQs
* Cited in the 2021 “Global Lead Exposure Report”
* The critique from the CDC in 2007
* The critique paper from 2013
* The critique paper from 2016
* The correction from 2019
* The critique paper from 2020
* Quasi experiments: from Rhode Island; using manufacturing employment
* 2018 paper on low-level lead and all-cause mortality
Credits
The Studies Show is produced by Julian Mayers at Yada Yada Productions.


This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.thestudiesshowpod.com/subscribe