The Wall Street Journal has an interesting article today about a Cornell economist, Michael Waldman, who has done some fancy math linking TV use to autism [orig. paper here]. Whether Waldman is on to something remains to be seen. His statistics don't come close to proving that early TV watching causes autism. He has only observed that rates of autism diagnosis tend to be higher when kids are raised in periods of heavy rain and snowy weather, and in places where cable-TV subscriptions are high. And his paper is unpublished. Still, it's good to see someone with a brain like his asking questions.

Unfortunately, a number of autism experts disagree. That they doubt the merit of Waldman's research is natural and fair; his work is as-of-yet untested. But they actually seem to resent the fact that Waldman is even raising the TV question.

"Whenever there is a fad in autism, what people unfortunately fail to see is how parents suffer," says [Ami] Klin [at the Yale Child Study Center]".

"This is junk science," says Alison Singer, parent of an autistic child and serior vice president of Autism Speaks. "Autism is a genetic disoder. The only thing the parents do wrong is they have bad genes".

And:

"I think this is irresponsible," says Klin. "We should not provide clinical advice unless there is scientific evidence to substantiate it".

But, really, what's the clinical advice here? Don't let your toddlers watch a lot of TV? Perhaps someone should tell Dr. Klin that the American Academy of Pediatrics long ago established guidelines recommending no television for kids under 2 (and substantial limits on TV-time for older children).

MIND AND MATTER.

Is an Economist Qualified.

To Solve Puzzle of Autism?

Professor's Hypothesis:

Rainy Days and TV.

May Trigger Condition.

By MARK WHITEHOUSE.

February 27, 2007; Page A1.

In the spring of 2005, Cornell University economist Michael Waldman noticed a strange correlation in Washington, Oregon and California. The more it rained or snowed, the more likely children were to be diagnosed with autism.

[Michael Waldman].

To most people, the observation would have been little more than a riddle. But it soon led Prof. Waldman to conclude that something children do more during rain or snow -- perhaps watching television -- must influence autism. Last October, Cornell announced the resulting paper in a news release headlined, "Early childhood TV viewing may trigger autism, data analysis suggests".

Prof. Waldman's willingness to hazard an opinion on a delicate matter of science reflects the growing ambition of economists -- and also their growing hubris, in the view of critics. Academic economists are increasingly venturing beyond their traditional stomping ground, a wanderlust that has produced some powerful results but also has raised concerns about whether they're sometimes going too far.

Ami Klin, director of the autism program at the Yale Child Study Center, says Prof. Waldman needlessly wounded families by advertising an unpublished paper that lacks support from clinical studies of actual children. "Whenever there is a fad in autism, what people unfortunately fail to see is how parents suffer," says Dr. Klin. "The moment you start to use economics to study the cause of autism, I think you've crossed a boundary".

Prof. Waldman, who thinks television restriction may have helped rescue his own son from autism, says a number of noneconomists don't understand the methods he used. His paper recommends that parents keep young children away from television until more rigorous studies can be done. "I've gotten a lot of nasty emails," he says. "But if people aren't following up on this, it's a crime".

Such debates are likely to grow as economists delve into issues in education, politics, history and even epidemiology. Prof. Waldman's use of precipitation illustrates one of the tools that has emboldened them: the instrumental variable, a statistical method that, by introducing some random or natural influence, helps economists sort out questions of cause and effect. Using the technique, they can create "natural experiments" that seek to approximate the rigor of randomized trials -- the traditional gold standard of medical research.

Instrumental variables have helped prominent scientists shed light on sensitive topics. Joshua Angrist of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has studied the cost of war, the University of Chicago's Steven Levitt has examined the effect of adding police on crime, and Harvard's Caroline Hoxby has studied school performance. Their work has played an important role in public-policy debates.

But as enthusiasm for the approach has grown, so too have questions. One concern: When economists use one variable as a proxy for another -- rainfall patterns instead of TV viewing, for example -- it's not always clear what the results actually measure. Also, the experiments on their own offer little insight into why one thing affects another.

"There's a saying that ignorance is bliss," says James Heckman, an economics professor at the University of Chicago who won a Nobel Prize in 2000 for his work on statistical methods. "I believe that characterizes a lot of the enthusiasm for these instruments." Says MIT economist Jerry Hausman, "If your instruments aren't perfect, you could go seriously wrong".

By suggesting that something within parents' control could be triggering autism, Prof. Waldman has reopened old wounds in the realm of autism research, which is littered with debunked theories linking the disorder to the family environment.

"This is junk science," says Alison Singer, parent of an autistic child and senior vice president of Autism Speaks, a nonprofit founded by former NBC Universal Chief Executive Bob Wright. "Autism is a genetic disorder. The only thing the parents do wrong is they have bad genes".

The term "autism" describes a spectrum of diagnoses with symptoms that may include impaired language skills, difficulty understanding social cues, and an obsession with routine or repetitive actions. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that as a number of as one in 150 children in certain parts of the U.S. have some form of autism.

[Autism].

Studies in recent decades have shown the proportion of children with autism growing, though scientists aren't sure the disorder has actually become more prevalent. Greater awareness, broadening definitions of the disorder and the availability of special-education programs may have made parents more likely to get their children diagnosed.

Over the years, attempts to understand the affliction have been tough on parents. One of the earliest, the "refrigerator mother" theory, blamed autism on a lack of maternal affection. Popularized by celebrity psychology expert Bruno Bettelheim, the theory survived from the 1940s until the late 1960s, virtually demonizing mothers of autistic children until more-careful studies failed to support the idea. More recently, a scare about measles vaccinations stirred anxiety, but large studies have shown no link to autism.

Most scientists now recognize that heredity plays a central role in autism, and they are making progress in identifying the genes responsible. They're also looking into the possibility of interaction with environmental factors, both in the womb and after birth.

Some experts believe that in reaction to the discredited theories the pendulum has swung too far away from the family. "The discussion of the role of the family, and social interaction within the family, is virtually taboo," says Anna Baumgaertel, a developmental-behavioral pediatrician at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. She says some of her autistic patients have been heavy video and TV watchers since birth -- a factor she thinks "may lead to autistic behavior in susceptible children, because it interferes with the development of 'live' auditory, visual, and social experience".

Prof. Waldman, a recognized expert in the field of applied microeconomics, doesn't pretend to be an authority on autism. He became engrossed in the subject in the fall of 2003, when his 2-year-old son, David, was identified as having an autism-spectrum disorder. Hoping to eliminate any potential triggers, Prof. Waldman supplemented the recommended treatment with a sharp reduction in television watching. His son had started watching more TV in the summer before the diagnosis, after a baby sister was born.

Prof. Waldman says his son improved within six months and today has fully recovered -- a surprising result, given that autism is typically a lifetime affliction. "When I saw the rapid progress, which was certainly not what anyone had been predicting, I became very curious as to whether television watching might have played a role in the onset of the disorder," he says. He tried to get medical scientists interested in the idea, to no avail.


Posted by: Emily    Source

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