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Here's one of the latest studies presented at a pediatrics conference, which will soon be published in a peer-reviewed journal.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/05/130506095409.htm
Research Supports Laws That Require Bicyclists to Wear Helmets
May 6, 2013 — Bicycle helmets save lives, and their use should be required by law. That's the conclusion of a study to be presented Monday, May 6, at the Pediatric Academic Societies (PAS) annual meeting in Washington, DC.
Here's an older one from CMAJ:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/10/121015122159.htm
Bicycle Helmets Prevent Fatal Head Injuries, Study Finds
Oct. 15, 2012 — Cyclists who died of a head injury were three times as likely to not be wearing a helmet compared with those who died of other injuries, according to a study in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal). -- Nbauman ( talk) 15:12, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
Recently a number of helmet advocates from Australia have started to frequently edit this page. While pretending to be neutral, most of the edits tend to promote helmets. One typical tactic is to quote a study that appears genuine but is actually misleading. There are plenty of them in Australia, as the government has funded many studies to defend its controversial helmet law. Typically, the studies make bold claims exaggerating the benefits of helmets. However, a close look at the underlying data often reveals that these bold claims are not supported by the underlying data. This lead others to rebut the misleading claims and make counterclaims. Some helmet advocates have also attempted to abuse Wikipedia guidelines to bully skeptics into submission, or to bury the counterclaims in footnotes, resulting in misleading claims being given undue prominence.
Many of those studies can be found in the Time-trend analyses section
A helmet advocate recently promoted an Australian study by adding this:
This turned out to be a biased and misrepresentative description of the actual study. The description of this study was later corrected:
What can be concluded about helmets from that? Why mention the study in this article then? Why not remove it as it provides little useful information.
Another misleading study was quoted, leading to the inevitable rebuttals
What is not disclosed is that the study was funded by the Victorian government, who was keen to justify its policy after boasting that it was the "first in the world" to introduce a bicycle helmet law.
Why keep the study claims & counterclaims in this article? This long list of claims and counterclaims leaves most people confused. It is neither useful nor informative to most readers.
Helmet advocates even promoted their own studies, using this description:
This fails to disclose that the study was partly funded by a government agency with a vested interest in defending a government policy that was being challenged. One of the study authors, Tim Churches, had been advocating helmets for years before participating in this study. Controversial aspects of the study were not disclosed, notably that the authors have refused to release the data that would enable an independent analysis of its claims. I added the omitted conflicts of interests and used an actual quote from the study to better reflect its content. Tim Churches used bullying tactics ( "Reported to WP authorities" ) to try to squash the disclosure of conflicts of interests. The description of this study has mysteriously disappeared since.
These are not the only examples. There are many more, some already added to this article, many others recently added to the "bicycle helmets in Australia" article.
Should the discussion about the misleading Australian studies and the inevitable counterclaims be in this article, or should it be kept in the "bicycle helmets in Australia" article?
Has this article been made any clearer by these set of claims and counterclaims? Why not remove them? Harvey4931 ( talk) 11:11, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
Several helmet advocates have not engaged in discussions, yet keep adding more studies in the already overwhelming time-trend analysis section. Those additional studies should be removed while we discuss how best to present this. There is no point adding to the confusion. This section is becoming less readable, and more confusing with every set of claims & counterclaims.
Please keep in mind we are writing an article in an encyclopaedia, for the general reader. As such, we need to provide a general overview of the main issue that is clear and concise format. A long list of questionable studies, with claims and counterclaims, is of no interest to the general reader. It is confusing and overwhelming.
Most of the "Time-Trend analysis" section should be removed, except for the first two paragraphs that provide a general overview of the topic. True science is based on repeatable experiments. Such studies are not true science. They are not a controlled experiment; statistics are gathered from observational data. It is impossible to tell whether the observed behavior is due to helmet wearing, or to a confounding variable that may not even be recorded. No causation or scientific measurement about the effectiveness of helmets can be derived from that. To list all those claims, as it they were genuine science is misleading and confusing. This article is not the place for a repository for questionable studies misleading claims and their inevitable counterclaims. Harvey4931 ( talk) 08:05, 19 May 2013 (UTC)
As a newcomer to this article curious about the topic, as I read through I was thinking "Ah, so it seems the jury is out - cycle helmets may or may not be advantageous". But then I get to a mention of a Cochrane meta-analysis concluding that helmets do have benefit. Surely this is a solid gold source for biomedical information and its findings should be reflected in the overall tenor of this article. As it is, its conclusions seem unduly qualified by single-author articles questioning its outcome. Alexbrn talk| contribs| COI 07:12, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
I have restored the reference to this study in the "Rotational Injury" section of the article - someone had removed it and substituted a reference to a another study by McIntosh et al. which deals only with motorcycle helmets. Unfortunately, it seems the publisher has made a mistake and the McIntosh et al. paper and one other paper are missing from the online journal contents (you can see the gap in the page numbers for that issue). The corresponding author is endeavouring to have that corrected, but the paper does exist, I have seen a copy of it. It isn't indexed in PubMed yet either. In the meantime, I will post of a copy of the abstract from the paper here:
Tim C ( talk) 22:47, 19 May 2013 (UTC)
"A critique by Olivier[4], of the School of Mathematics and Statistics at the University of New South Wales [55], noted that Clarke's conclusions failed to meet any of the Bradford Hill criteria necessary to establish a causal relationship."
This 'add on' is an opinion view that was posted on the Conversation, no prior contact with the author Colin Clarke, and not subject to peer review, as the original article was. It is used on Wiki to undermine the published article. Replies were posted to the Conversation addressing the points raised. The opinion piece claiming it does not meet a Bradford Hill criteria may have both positive and negative aspects. Jake Olivier own report on NSW states "The results suggest that the initial observed benefit of MHL has been maintained over the ensuing decades." so he is actually involved in producing reports that appear to be supporting MHL. This is not to say he is doing anything wrong, but his negative view of the Clarke report is questionable. Clarke used cyclist and pedestrain annual fatality data, injury data to match survey periods and was accepted as being suitable by the New Zealand Medical Journal. Jake Olivier can access all the data. Adding an opinion from someone who is actively involved in providing pro MHL reports base on his claim, that is questionable, is not providing a NPOV to the article. His view has not been published in the NZMJ as far as I know. Unless good reasons can be provided I intend to remove the above as not being a NPOV.
~~Colin at cycling~~ — Preceding unsigned comment added by Colin at cycling ( talk • contribs) 19:19, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
Considering about request.
Deleted comments made about Clarke, authors details provided in the NZ article. ~~Colin at cycling~~ — Preceding unsigned comment added by Colin at cycling ( talk • contribs) 12:09, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
I have reverted the deletion by Tim C of my deletion of this reference. The issue is not whether Oliver has peer-reviewed publications elsewhere. The referenced "study" (as it was referred to) was a comment on a non-peer reviewed web forum. Oliver's critique was itself critiqued by other authors, experts in the field with their own peer-reviewed publications, in the same web forum. The reference did not mention this and so is NPOV editorial being used to counter a claim made in a peer-reviewed journal and hence inappropriate for Wikipedia. If you wish to attempt to expand the reference making it clear the source is non peer-reviewed and was itself critiqued by others of at least similar standing to Oliver then you may try to do this; but would that really be worthwhile (or possible in a NPOV way)? Kiwikiped ( talk) 23:08, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
Just to try and clear up some issues, 'conflict of interest' seems to cover a range of issues, being the author of a paper seems to count in a minor way, no substantial conflcit of interest exists.
Providing a critique to a published article is of course fine, providing it is reliable.
Conversation article, “Don’t blame mandatory helmets for cyclist deaths in New Zealand”
Nowhere in the article does it blame the deaths of any cyclists for either wearing or not wearing helmets. The title may be inappropriate and possibly confusing.
it states “Clarke does compare data from before and after the helmet laws were introduced. But the data is from 1988 to 1991 (three years before the helmet laws) and 2003 to 2007 (13 years later). Clarke presents no data from around the time the laws were introduced, with the exception of fatalities.”
This may give the impression that a proper research approach was not taken.
It states
“Clarke links a 51% reduction in average hours cycled per person by comparing years 1989 to 1990 with 2006 to 2009. Again, neither period is near the introduction of mandatory helmet laws.”
The NZ paper provides data from the limited national surveys for 89-90, 97-98, 03-06 and 06-09, showing average hours cycled reduced, 40% by 97-98 and by 53% 2003-06, 51% by 2006-09, therefore the above claim is not really correct.
Pedestrian and cyclist fatality data is shows for 21 years, showing a downward trend for both. Travel data on hours walking and cycling were provided from the 4 national surveys. Injury data is provided and matched to hours travel for 3 periods, 88-91, 96-99, 2003-07.
It states
“Clarke makes no attempt to address confounding factors and attributes all declines in cycling rates and increases in cycling fatalities and injuries to the helmet law.”
The NZ paper states
“Fatality comparison, cyclist vs pedestrians (1989–2009)—The fatality data shows a significant reduction for both cyclists and pedestrians over the past two decades.”
The NZ paper mentions changes by some age groups, e.g
“Collins et al reported that 39% of all cyclist fatalities in NZ occurred to those aged 5–14 years for the period 1979/88.8 For the age group 5–17 years they may have traditionally incurred about 45% or more of cyclist fatalities and they had a reduction in cycling of about 75%.” The paper compared cyclists to pedestrians and other road users in various parts so to some extent it does include an element of considering confounders, changing road accident risk levels, changes to age groups of cyclists.
The Jake critique has some points that may be valid but it also may not fully balance the information published and without consulting the author about the approach seems to have misunderstands key aspects. Consequently the conclusions and remarks posted on the Conversation and Wiki tend to mislead readers.
Including the Conversation article tends to lead readers to what appears to be an unreliable article, if it had been reliable, no problem really.
The 53 premature deaths, data is provided in the article and the approach taken to reach the figure. It was part of the findings, some may not like the findings or have their view about the method. This is additional research.
Balancing the issue of a author and trying to avoid the public misundertsanding an issue is a problem.
~~Colin at cycling~~ — Preceding unsigned comment added by Colin at cycling ( talk • contribs) 08:36, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
I note that the latest edits to the article by User:Colin at cycling were to add, as a critique of a 2012 study by Persaud et al, a lengthy summary of an online non-peer-reviewed response to that study by Colin F Clarke. Yet in this thread we are discussing the deletion by User:Colin at cycling of all mention of and reference to an online critique by Olivier of a paper by Colin F Clarke. Does anyone else see a problem here? Tim C ( talk) 21:42, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Sorry to re-open this thread, but I have just noticed that Colin Clarke has contributed two comments in the last two days (in addition to many previous ones) to an article about bicycle helmets in The Conversation - see http://theconversation.com/profiles/colin-clarke-1651/activities?filter=comments Given Colin Clarke's willingness to use The Conversation as a vehicle to engage with other people's research on bicycle helmets, I can see no reasonable justification to exclude from this WP article reference to an article in The Conversation by Olivier which engages with Coin Clarke's research. Sauce for the goose etc, as the aphorism goes. And before User:Colin at cycling responds here, I must insist that he declares a lack of conflict of interest with respect to Colin Clarke, or otherwise stay silent on this issue. Tim C ( talk) 21:10, 9 May 2013 (UTC)
Repeating the above "Just to try and clear up some issues, 'conflict of interest' seems to cover a range of issues, being the author of a paper seems to count in a minor way, no substantial conflcit of interest exists."
Colin Clarke does not work for, consult to, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article as far as I know.
Tim's assertion is if Colin Clarke comments anywhere that can be included in Wiki on an equal basis to peer review. A little suspect I expect. Kindly focus on the research aspect of the topic if possible and not individuals. ~~Colin at cycling~~ — Preceding unsigned comment added by Colin at cycling ( talk • contribs) 09:05, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
I have restored the reference to Jake Olivier's critique of the 2012 Colin F Clarke paper on helmet laws in NZ. Arguments that highly relevant articles in The Conversation by respected researchers are not acceptable as reliable sources for WP have no merit. I note also that in the related WP article Bicycle helmets in Australia, User:Colin_at_cycling recently referenced a non-peer-reviewed online comment by Colin F. Clarke which critiqued a peer-reviewed Canadian paper by Persaud et al. If User:Colin_at_cycling regards such an online critique of a paper as a sufficiently reliable source for WP articles, then he can have no objection to citing a critique published in The Conversation - see http://en.wikipedia.org/?title=Bicycle_helmets_in_Australia&diff=554421864&oldid=554104696 Tim C ( talk) 04:24, 18 May 2013 (UTC)
In the "bicycle helmets in Australia" talk page, Tim Churches posted this discussion. I have copied it here for convenience, adding the emphasis in bold.
Tim ignored the reply that this could be abused to give undue prominence to misleading content, then now proceeds to do that. This violates Wikipedia policy of describing alternate points of view neutrally. Tim claims that this is done "to improve readability". This seems disingenuous. As discussed, a better way to improve readability is to remove the set of claims and counterclaims that confuses people.
Burying counterclaims in footnotes may not improve readability, but it does improve helmet advocates ability to mislead readers by giving undue prominence to misleading claims. Harvey4931 ( talk) 10:56, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
Since this technique of misusing footnotes has been exposed, a similar technique has emerged. It can be seen in this example:
“The sudden increase in helmet wearing by cyclists in NSW at the time of the introduction of compulsory helmet laws, corresponded with a sudden drop in the by-month ratio of head injury rates to limb injury rates in cyclists.[42] Criticisms of this study and a response by its authors have been published in the peer-reviewed literature, with additional commentary on web sites and blogs.[43][44][45][46]”
It is a slight variation on the misuse of footnotes technique. It presents a misleading claim as an assertion, then leaves the reader to dig out references to find out a balancing argument. This gives undue prominence to the misleading material, resulting in a misleading article. Harvey4931 ( talk) 14:13, 28 May 2013 (UTC)
User:Kiwikiped has recently removed editorial attribution from references to anonymously-authored articles published by the Bicycle Helmet Research Foundation (BHRF). In my view, this is unacceptable: if the BHRF is to be considered a reliable source as per WP guidelines, then named persons need to take responsibility for the material that is referenced. The vast majority of reliable sources do this by naming the authors of the content they publish. In some cases, the BHRF does this, but most of its articles are unattributed to any author. User:Richard Keatinge who is the sole board member of the UK company behind the BHRF, has explained elsewhere that this is done to protect the identity of the authors, and instead, the BHRF Editorial Board takes collective responsibility for such anonymously-authored content. OK, but in that case, members of the BHRF editorial board must be named as editors for any BHRF article referenced in WP which does not otherwise have a named author. Either that, or those references and the content which they support need to be removed from the article. The BHRF cannot have it both ways: it can't be considered a reliable source while also hiding behind a cloak of anonymity.
It would be helpful if User:Kiwikiped could explain the rationale for removing the list of named editors of referenced article, in the absence of named authors for those articles. And confirm that s/he has no conflict of interest with respect to the BHRF Editorial Board. Tim C ( talk) 06:20, 30 April 2013 (UTC)
User:Kiwikiped, you may sigh as much as you like, but I am acting entirely in good faith. I honestly fail to understand why listing the names of the BHRF editorial board members, as editors, for referenced BHRF articles that do not have a named author is somehow an "inappropriate attribution". It is important to know who is responsible for the referenced content. Here is why: if you peruse the text and the reference list of this article, and related WP articles on bicycle helmets, one cannot fail to notice just how many times the name of one particular author is mentioned: that author is Dorothy Robinson. Her published papers are cited over and over in these articles. But Dorothy Robinson is also a Patron of the Bicycle Helmet Research Foundation, and a Member of its Editorial Board. It is therefore important that it is apparent to readers that Dorothy Robinson is also responsible, at least in part, for BHRF articles which are cited in this article. The same applies, to a lesser degree, to Bill Curnow, and other members of the BHRF editorial board whose papers published elsewhere are cited in this WP article. In my view, it is entirely reasonable to required the individuals responsible for cited BHRF content to be named, ideally as authors of the content, but failing that, as members of the responsible editorial board. Why is this so objectionable? Could User:Richard Keatinge explain on behalf of the BHRF? Or perhaps User:Nigel Perry, another BHRF editorial board member? Tim C ( talk) 07:11, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
Update:
As before I've been in and done some cleanup, this time on the pages Bicycle Helmets in Australia and Bicycle Helmets in New Zealand. I took no notice of who had made edits (I didn't even look, working from page content only) or the POV of those edits, I just cleaned up. There were a few references which were incorrectly structured (producing errors on the page), so I fixed those as well. My only observation is that whoever (as I said I didn't both to look) the folk are who editing the New Zealand page they seem far better behaved based on what the current content is. The Australian page contains a few long quotes in the references - not usually the place to put such things - maybe this an editing mishap and a delimiter is in the wrong place? I didn't look into those. Kiwikiped ( talk) 02:32, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
Chris Capoccia & Tim C - Just in case it was not clear, the fixes I made, over and above those indicated by this thread, where essentially structural. Wikipedia was complaining that some references were badly formed, others did not appear correctly/consistently as they were not in cite format - I just fixed these. If there is an issue of the content of the references then you two should start a new topic or the issue will get lost in the tail end of this one. Kiwikiped ( talk) 18:28, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
Why would anyone spend so much of their energy targeting BHRF? Wasn’t the discussion in Talk:Bicycle helmets in Australia enough? Harvey4931 ( talk) 14:00, 28 May 2013 (UTC)
There seems to be some confusion between genuine science and junk science, from the studies quoted in this article. Such junk science is typically funded by a party with a vested interest, making misleading claims. One of them is the study from Attewell, described as follows:
“A 2001 meta-analysis of sixteen studies by Attewell et al. found that, compared to helmeted cyclists, unhelmeted cyclists were 2.4 times more likely to sustain a brain injury; 2.5 times more likely to sustain a head injury; and 3.7 times more likely to sustain a fatal injury.[89][90]”
This fails to disclose that the study was done by an Australian government agency with a vested interest in defending its controversial helmet law. In the executive summary, the authors deplore the low helmet wearing rate, hinting at what the real purpose of the study is.
The study claims to "provides overwhelming evidence in support of helmets for preventing head injury and fatal injury". That cannot be true. Observational data cannot produce overwhelming evidence, as there is no control group, and confounding factors are difficult to separate. This meta-analysis only picked 6 studies, all in favor in helmets. Such cherry-picking is not science.
In 2003, this study was rebutted in a technical journal. http://people.aapt.net.au/~theyan/cycling/Accident%20Analysis%20Prevention%202.pdf The rebuttal concluded: "This examination concentrates on injury to the brain and shows that the meta-analysis and its included studies take no account of scientific knowledge of its mechanisms. Consequently, the choice of studies for the meta-analysis and the collection, treatment and interpretation of their data lack the guidance needed to distinguish injuries caused through fracture of the skull and by angular acceleration. It is shown that the design of helmets reflects a discredited theory of brain injury. The conclusions are that the meta-analysis does not provide scientific evidence that such helmets reduce serious injury to the brain, and the Australian policy of compulsory wearing lacks a basis of verified efficacy against brain injury." The study authors did not reply to the rebuttal, thus giving up on its claims.
In 2011, this study was re-analysed. http://www.cycle-helmets.com/elvik.pdf The re-analysis concluded: "This paper shows that the meta-analysis of bicycle helmet efficacy reported by Attewell, Glase, and McFadden (Accident Analysis and Prevention 2001, 345–352) was influenced by publication bias and time-trend bias that was not controlled for. As a result, the analysis reported inflated estimates of the effects of bicycle helmets". This should not be surprising, given the cherry-picking of favorable studies. A 2012 revision of this re-analysis confirms the publication and time-trend bias, and concludes that: "According to the new studies, no overall effect of bicycle helmets could be found when injuries to head, face or neck are considered as a whole." Yet it has been misrepresented in the article without mentioning the publication and time-trend bias.
Despite the conflicts of interests and the exposed flaws in the study, this study has been misrepresented in this article as if it was genuine science. This is misleading & deceptive. Such junk science should not quoted in Wikipedia as if it was genuine science. It may be a good illustration of propaganda from a government desperate to justify its controversial legislation, but it is not science.
Another misrepresentation using junk science relates to rotational injury. This is the current description in the rotational injury Section: "Curnow has suggested that the major causes of permanent intellectual disablement and death after head injury may be torsional forces leading to diffuse axonal injury(DAI), a form of injury which usual helmets cannot mitigate and may make worse.[79] However, Curnow's hypotheses are disputed" ...
This is highly biased and misleading. It denigrates the findings that helmets can increase rotational acceleration as "curnow's hypothesis". That is not true. This was first reported by research conducted in 1987 (mentioned in the previous paragraph), and confirmed by other studies. It cannot be denigrated as an hypothesis.
Another "study" is quoted, claiming that it proves that helmets reduce brain injury. It is described as follows: "An experimental study (to be published) by McIntoshet al. tested Curnow’s hypothesis that bicycle helmets increase angular acceleration during a crash, and found that they actually reduced both linear and angular acceleration by a considerable margin.[44][143] "
This is highly misleading as it fails to disclose that the study was about motorcycle helmets, not bicycle helmets. Additionally, this study was conducted at unrealistically low speeds (35 km/h) for motorcycles.
Such junk science has no place in Wikipedia. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Harvey4931 ( talk • contribs) 08:28, 19 May 2013 (UTC)
Tim C, Please do not use a straw man argument: misrepresenting my position in an attempt to denigrate it. This is derogatory. I have NEVER asserted that all studies funded by the government are untrustworthy.
It is standard practice to disclose funding and conflicts of interests. A conflict of interest is a warning signal, nothing more. It is disclosed because it is a relevant information. It does not make the material worthless. The denigrating statement that I do not accept junk science because "you don't like their findings" is another unfounded derogatory statement. Please do not make any further unfounded or derogatory accusations.
Flawed or misleading material should not be misrepresented as science. It is the unscientific methods used, as well as misleading statements not supported by the data, that makes them unworthy. The Attewell study has been rebutted twice, and has been shown to be influenced by publication bias and time-trend bias. There is a clear conflict of interest. The study makes impossible policy related claims. All this makes its claims not reliable. No tangible reason has been supplied to justify why such flawed and biased material should be presented as if it was genuine science.
A large edit was made by Tim C on the 19th of May. It was claimed that the changes were reverting other changes not discussed in the talk page. This is not true. Each of these change has been discussed upfront in the talk pages. This bulk edit also contained several unrelated stealth changes (Not first time deceptive changes occurred like that). Notably, a misleading description of his own study was put back yet again, despite being discussed many times in the talk pages. Additionally, the following description of a study recently added in rotational acceleration section was deleted.
Research done in Sweden in 1991 reported that "The non-shell helmet did in all trials grab the asphalt surface, which rotated the head together with the helmet. The consequences were in addition to the rotating of the head, a heavily bent and compressed neck, transmitted on through the whole test dummy body after the impact". An average angular acceleration of 20,800 rad/s-² for rotating the head was reported.
The next day Tim C added back the same study, using a misleading description that downplays the risks of rotational acceleration and neck injury for non-shell helmets, as if the version stealthily deleted never existed.
A 1993 study of bicycle helmet chin-strap forces in simulated oblique road surface impacts measured peak rotational acceleration in crash test dummy heads of 28000 rads/s2 for a non-shell helmet (also known as "soft-shell" helmets) in a 34km/h test. However, the investigators reported that "...[hard] shell helmets slid against the asphalt surface and there was only a slight angular movement of the head when the head was pushed upwards." Comparison tests on unhelmeted crash test heads were not performed.[143]
Those bulk deceptive changes have been reverted until the discussion is resolved. I trust that Tim C is capable of following his own rule of not making bulk changes without discussing them first. It would also be helpful if he stopped making misleading descriptions in the revision history while making stealth changes. Harvey4931 ( talk) 14:40, 28 May 2013 (UTC)
![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | ← | Archive 3 | Archive 4 | Archive 5 | Archive 6 |
Here's one of the latest studies presented at a pediatrics conference, which will soon be published in a peer-reviewed journal.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/05/130506095409.htm
Research Supports Laws That Require Bicyclists to Wear Helmets
May 6, 2013 — Bicycle helmets save lives, and their use should be required by law. That's the conclusion of a study to be presented Monday, May 6, at the Pediatric Academic Societies (PAS) annual meeting in Washington, DC.
Here's an older one from CMAJ:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/10/121015122159.htm
Bicycle Helmets Prevent Fatal Head Injuries, Study Finds
Oct. 15, 2012 — Cyclists who died of a head injury were three times as likely to not be wearing a helmet compared with those who died of other injuries, according to a study in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal). -- Nbauman ( talk) 15:12, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
Recently a number of helmet advocates from Australia have started to frequently edit this page. While pretending to be neutral, most of the edits tend to promote helmets. One typical tactic is to quote a study that appears genuine but is actually misleading. There are plenty of them in Australia, as the government has funded many studies to defend its controversial helmet law. Typically, the studies make bold claims exaggerating the benefits of helmets. However, a close look at the underlying data often reveals that these bold claims are not supported by the underlying data. This lead others to rebut the misleading claims and make counterclaims. Some helmet advocates have also attempted to abuse Wikipedia guidelines to bully skeptics into submission, or to bury the counterclaims in footnotes, resulting in misleading claims being given undue prominence.
Many of those studies can be found in the Time-trend analyses section
A helmet advocate recently promoted an Australian study by adding this:
This turned out to be a biased and misrepresentative description of the actual study. The description of this study was later corrected:
What can be concluded about helmets from that? Why mention the study in this article then? Why not remove it as it provides little useful information.
Another misleading study was quoted, leading to the inevitable rebuttals
What is not disclosed is that the study was funded by the Victorian government, who was keen to justify its policy after boasting that it was the "first in the world" to introduce a bicycle helmet law.
Why keep the study claims & counterclaims in this article? This long list of claims and counterclaims leaves most people confused. It is neither useful nor informative to most readers.
Helmet advocates even promoted their own studies, using this description:
This fails to disclose that the study was partly funded by a government agency with a vested interest in defending a government policy that was being challenged. One of the study authors, Tim Churches, had been advocating helmets for years before participating in this study. Controversial aspects of the study were not disclosed, notably that the authors have refused to release the data that would enable an independent analysis of its claims. I added the omitted conflicts of interests and used an actual quote from the study to better reflect its content. Tim Churches used bullying tactics ( "Reported to WP authorities" ) to try to squash the disclosure of conflicts of interests. The description of this study has mysteriously disappeared since.
These are not the only examples. There are many more, some already added to this article, many others recently added to the "bicycle helmets in Australia" article.
Should the discussion about the misleading Australian studies and the inevitable counterclaims be in this article, or should it be kept in the "bicycle helmets in Australia" article?
Has this article been made any clearer by these set of claims and counterclaims? Why not remove them? Harvey4931 ( talk) 11:11, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
Several helmet advocates have not engaged in discussions, yet keep adding more studies in the already overwhelming time-trend analysis section. Those additional studies should be removed while we discuss how best to present this. There is no point adding to the confusion. This section is becoming less readable, and more confusing with every set of claims & counterclaims.
Please keep in mind we are writing an article in an encyclopaedia, for the general reader. As such, we need to provide a general overview of the main issue that is clear and concise format. A long list of questionable studies, with claims and counterclaims, is of no interest to the general reader. It is confusing and overwhelming.
Most of the "Time-Trend analysis" section should be removed, except for the first two paragraphs that provide a general overview of the topic. True science is based on repeatable experiments. Such studies are not true science. They are not a controlled experiment; statistics are gathered from observational data. It is impossible to tell whether the observed behavior is due to helmet wearing, or to a confounding variable that may not even be recorded. No causation or scientific measurement about the effectiveness of helmets can be derived from that. To list all those claims, as it they were genuine science is misleading and confusing. This article is not the place for a repository for questionable studies misleading claims and their inevitable counterclaims. Harvey4931 ( talk) 08:05, 19 May 2013 (UTC)
As a newcomer to this article curious about the topic, as I read through I was thinking "Ah, so it seems the jury is out - cycle helmets may or may not be advantageous". But then I get to a mention of a Cochrane meta-analysis concluding that helmets do have benefit. Surely this is a solid gold source for biomedical information and its findings should be reflected in the overall tenor of this article. As it is, its conclusions seem unduly qualified by single-author articles questioning its outcome. Alexbrn talk| contribs| COI 07:12, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
I have restored the reference to this study in the "Rotational Injury" section of the article - someone had removed it and substituted a reference to a another study by McIntosh et al. which deals only with motorcycle helmets. Unfortunately, it seems the publisher has made a mistake and the McIntosh et al. paper and one other paper are missing from the online journal contents (you can see the gap in the page numbers for that issue). The corresponding author is endeavouring to have that corrected, but the paper does exist, I have seen a copy of it. It isn't indexed in PubMed yet either. In the meantime, I will post of a copy of the abstract from the paper here:
Tim C ( talk) 22:47, 19 May 2013 (UTC)
"A critique by Olivier[4], of the School of Mathematics and Statistics at the University of New South Wales [55], noted that Clarke's conclusions failed to meet any of the Bradford Hill criteria necessary to establish a causal relationship."
This 'add on' is an opinion view that was posted on the Conversation, no prior contact with the author Colin Clarke, and not subject to peer review, as the original article was. It is used on Wiki to undermine the published article. Replies were posted to the Conversation addressing the points raised. The opinion piece claiming it does not meet a Bradford Hill criteria may have both positive and negative aspects. Jake Olivier own report on NSW states "The results suggest that the initial observed benefit of MHL has been maintained over the ensuing decades." so he is actually involved in producing reports that appear to be supporting MHL. This is not to say he is doing anything wrong, but his negative view of the Clarke report is questionable. Clarke used cyclist and pedestrain annual fatality data, injury data to match survey periods and was accepted as being suitable by the New Zealand Medical Journal. Jake Olivier can access all the data. Adding an opinion from someone who is actively involved in providing pro MHL reports base on his claim, that is questionable, is not providing a NPOV to the article. His view has not been published in the NZMJ as far as I know. Unless good reasons can be provided I intend to remove the above as not being a NPOV.
~~Colin at cycling~~ — Preceding unsigned comment added by Colin at cycling ( talk • contribs) 19:19, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
Considering about request.
Deleted comments made about Clarke, authors details provided in the NZ article. ~~Colin at cycling~~ — Preceding unsigned comment added by Colin at cycling ( talk • contribs) 12:09, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
I have reverted the deletion by Tim C of my deletion of this reference. The issue is not whether Oliver has peer-reviewed publications elsewhere. The referenced "study" (as it was referred to) was a comment on a non-peer reviewed web forum. Oliver's critique was itself critiqued by other authors, experts in the field with their own peer-reviewed publications, in the same web forum. The reference did not mention this and so is NPOV editorial being used to counter a claim made in a peer-reviewed journal and hence inappropriate for Wikipedia. If you wish to attempt to expand the reference making it clear the source is non peer-reviewed and was itself critiqued by others of at least similar standing to Oliver then you may try to do this; but would that really be worthwhile (or possible in a NPOV way)? Kiwikiped ( talk) 23:08, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
Just to try and clear up some issues, 'conflict of interest' seems to cover a range of issues, being the author of a paper seems to count in a minor way, no substantial conflcit of interest exists.
Providing a critique to a published article is of course fine, providing it is reliable.
Conversation article, “Don’t blame mandatory helmets for cyclist deaths in New Zealand”
Nowhere in the article does it blame the deaths of any cyclists for either wearing or not wearing helmets. The title may be inappropriate and possibly confusing.
it states “Clarke does compare data from before and after the helmet laws were introduced. But the data is from 1988 to 1991 (three years before the helmet laws) and 2003 to 2007 (13 years later). Clarke presents no data from around the time the laws were introduced, with the exception of fatalities.”
This may give the impression that a proper research approach was not taken.
It states
“Clarke links a 51% reduction in average hours cycled per person by comparing years 1989 to 1990 with 2006 to 2009. Again, neither period is near the introduction of mandatory helmet laws.”
The NZ paper provides data from the limited national surveys for 89-90, 97-98, 03-06 and 06-09, showing average hours cycled reduced, 40% by 97-98 and by 53% 2003-06, 51% by 2006-09, therefore the above claim is not really correct.
Pedestrian and cyclist fatality data is shows for 21 years, showing a downward trend for both. Travel data on hours walking and cycling were provided from the 4 national surveys. Injury data is provided and matched to hours travel for 3 periods, 88-91, 96-99, 2003-07.
It states
“Clarke makes no attempt to address confounding factors and attributes all declines in cycling rates and increases in cycling fatalities and injuries to the helmet law.”
The NZ paper states
“Fatality comparison, cyclist vs pedestrians (1989–2009)—The fatality data shows a significant reduction for both cyclists and pedestrians over the past two decades.”
The NZ paper mentions changes by some age groups, e.g
“Collins et al reported that 39% of all cyclist fatalities in NZ occurred to those aged 5–14 years for the period 1979/88.8 For the age group 5–17 years they may have traditionally incurred about 45% or more of cyclist fatalities and they had a reduction in cycling of about 75%.” The paper compared cyclists to pedestrians and other road users in various parts so to some extent it does include an element of considering confounders, changing road accident risk levels, changes to age groups of cyclists.
The Jake critique has some points that may be valid but it also may not fully balance the information published and without consulting the author about the approach seems to have misunderstands key aspects. Consequently the conclusions and remarks posted on the Conversation and Wiki tend to mislead readers.
Including the Conversation article tends to lead readers to what appears to be an unreliable article, if it had been reliable, no problem really.
The 53 premature deaths, data is provided in the article and the approach taken to reach the figure. It was part of the findings, some may not like the findings or have their view about the method. This is additional research.
Balancing the issue of a author and trying to avoid the public misundertsanding an issue is a problem.
~~Colin at cycling~~ — Preceding unsigned comment added by Colin at cycling ( talk • contribs) 08:36, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
I note that the latest edits to the article by User:Colin at cycling were to add, as a critique of a 2012 study by Persaud et al, a lengthy summary of an online non-peer-reviewed response to that study by Colin F Clarke. Yet in this thread we are discussing the deletion by User:Colin at cycling of all mention of and reference to an online critique by Olivier of a paper by Colin F Clarke. Does anyone else see a problem here? Tim C ( talk) 21:42, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Sorry to re-open this thread, but I have just noticed that Colin Clarke has contributed two comments in the last two days (in addition to many previous ones) to an article about bicycle helmets in The Conversation - see http://theconversation.com/profiles/colin-clarke-1651/activities?filter=comments Given Colin Clarke's willingness to use The Conversation as a vehicle to engage with other people's research on bicycle helmets, I can see no reasonable justification to exclude from this WP article reference to an article in The Conversation by Olivier which engages with Coin Clarke's research. Sauce for the goose etc, as the aphorism goes. And before User:Colin at cycling responds here, I must insist that he declares a lack of conflict of interest with respect to Colin Clarke, or otherwise stay silent on this issue. Tim C ( talk) 21:10, 9 May 2013 (UTC)
Repeating the above "Just to try and clear up some issues, 'conflict of interest' seems to cover a range of issues, being the author of a paper seems to count in a minor way, no substantial conflcit of interest exists."
Colin Clarke does not work for, consult to, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article as far as I know.
Tim's assertion is if Colin Clarke comments anywhere that can be included in Wiki on an equal basis to peer review. A little suspect I expect. Kindly focus on the research aspect of the topic if possible and not individuals. ~~Colin at cycling~~ — Preceding unsigned comment added by Colin at cycling ( talk • contribs) 09:05, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
I have restored the reference to Jake Olivier's critique of the 2012 Colin F Clarke paper on helmet laws in NZ. Arguments that highly relevant articles in The Conversation by respected researchers are not acceptable as reliable sources for WP have no merit. I note also that in the related WP article Bicycle helmets in Australia, User:Colin_at_cycling recently referenced a non-peer-reviewed online comment by Colin F. Clarke which critiqued a peer-reviewed Canadian paper by Persaud et al. If User:Colin_at_cycling regards such an online critique of a paper as a sufficiently reliable source for WP articles, then he can have no objection to citing a critique published in The Conversation - see http://en.wikipedia.org/?title=Bicycle_helmets_in_Australia&diff=554421864&oldid=554104696 Tim C ( talk) 04:24, 18 May 2013 (UTC)
In the "bicycle helmets in Australia" talk page, Tim Churches posted this discussion. I have copied it here for convenience, adding the emphasis in bold.
Tim ignored the reply that this could be abused to give undue prominence to misleading content, then now proceeds to do that. This violates Wikipedia policy of describing alternate points of view neutrally. Tim claims that this is done "to improve readability". This seems disingenuous. As discussed, a better way to improve readability is to remove the set of claims and counterclaims that confuses people.
Burying counterclaims in footnotes may not improve readability, but it does improve helmet advocates ability to mislead readers by giving undue prominence to misleading claims. Harvey4931 ( talk) 10:56, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
Since this technique of misusing footnotes has been exposed, a similar technique has emerged. It can be seen in this example:
“The sudden increase in helmet wearing by cyclists in NSW at the time of the introduction of compulsory helmet laws, corresponded with a sudden drop in the by-month ratio of head injury rates to limb injury rates in cyclists.[42] Criticisms of this study and a response by its authors have been published in the peer-reviewed literature, with additional commentary on web sites and blogs.[43][44][45][46]”
It is a slight variation on the misuse of footnotes technique. It presents a misleading claim as an assertion, then leaves the reader to dig out references to find out a balancing argument. This gives undue prominence to the misleading material, resulting in a misleading article. Harvey4931 ( talk) 14:13, 28 May 2013 (UTC)
User:Kiwikiped has recently removed editorial attribution from references to anonymously-authored articles published by the Bicycle Helmet Research Foundation (BHRF). In my view, this is unacceptable: if the BHRF is to be considered a reliable source as per WP guidelines, then named persons need to take responsibility for the material that is referenced. The vast majority of reliable sources do this by naming the authors of the content they publish. In some cases, the BHRF does this, but most of its articles are unattributed to any author. User:Richard Keatinge who is the sole board member of the UK company behind the BHRF, has explained elsewhere that this is done to protect the identity of the authors, and instead, the BHRF Editorial Board takes collective responsibility for such anonymously-authored content. OK, but in that case, members of the BHRF editorial board must be named as editors for any BHRF article referenced in WP which does not otherwise have a named author. Either that, or those references and the content which they support need to be removed from the article. The BHRF cannot have it both ways: it can't be considered a reliable source while also hiding behind a cloak of anonymity.
It would be helpful if User:Kiwikiped could explain the rationale for removing the list of named editors of referenced article, in the absence of named authors for those articles. And confirm that s/he has no conflict of interest with respect to the BHRF Editorial Board. Tim C ( talk) 06:20, 30 April 2013 (UTC)
User:Kiwikiped, you may sigh as much as you like, but I am acting entirely in good faith. I honestly fail to understand why listing the names of the BHRF editorial board members, as editors, for referenced BHRF articles that do not have a named author is somehow an "inappropriate attribution". It is important to know who is responsible for the referenced content. Here is why: if you peruse the text and the reference list of this article, and related WP articles on bicycle helmets, one cannot fail to notice just how many times the name of one particular author is mentioned: that author is Dorothy Robinson. Her published papers are cited over and over in these articles. But Dorothy Robinson is also a Patron of the Bicycle Helmet Research Foundation, and a Member of its Editorial Board. It is therefore important that it is apparent to readers that Dorothy Robinson is also responsible, at least in part, for BHRF articles which are cited in this article. The same applies, to a lesser degree, to Bill Curnow, and other members of the BHRF editorial board whose papers published elsewhere are cited in this WP article. In my view, it is entirely reasonable to required the individuals responsible for cited BHRF content to be named, ideally as authors of the content, but failing that, as members of the responsible editorial board. Why is this so objectionable? Could User:Richard Keatinge explain on behalf of the BHRF? Or perhaps User:Nigel Perry, another BHRF editorial board member? Tim C ( talk) 07:11, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
Update:
As before I've been in and done some cleanup, this time on the pages Bicycle Helmets in Australia and Bicycle Helmets in New Zealand. I took no notice of who had made edits (I didn't even look, working from page content only) or the POV of those edits, I just cleaned up. There were a few references which were incorrectly structured (producing errors on the page), so I fixed those as well. My only observation is that whoever (as I said I didn't both to look) the folk are who editing the New Zealand page they seem far better behaved based on what the current content is. The Australian page contains a few long quotes in the references - not usually the place to put such things - maybe this an editing mishap and a delimiter is in the wrong place? I didn't look into those. Kiwikiped ( talk) 02:32, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
Chris Capoccia & Tim C - Just in case it was not clear, the fixes I made, over and above those indicated by this thread, where essentially structural. Wikipedia was complaining that some references were badly formed, others did not appear correctly/consistently as they were not in cite format - I just fixed these. If there is an issue of the content of the references then you two should start a new topic or the issue will get lost in the tail end of this one. Kiwikiped ( talk) 18:28, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
Why would anyone spend so much of their energy targeting BHRF? Wasn’t the discussion in Talk:Bicycle helmets in Australia enough? Harvey4931 ( talk) 14:00, 28 May 2013 (UTC)
There seems to be some confusion between genuine science and junk science, from the studies quoted in this article. Such junk science is typically funded by a party with a vested interest, making misleading claims. One of them is the study from Attewell, described as follows:
“A 2001 meta-analysis of sixteen studies by Attewell et al. found that, compared to helmeted cyclists, unhelmeted cyclists were 2.4 times more likely to sustain a brain injury; 2.5 times more likely to sustain a head injury; and 3.7 times more likely to sustain a fatal injury.[89][90]”
This fails to disclose that the study was done by an Australian government agency with a vested interest in defending its controversial helmet law. In the executive summary, the authors deplore the low helmet wearing rate, hinting at what the real purpose of the study is.
The study claims to "provides overwhelming evidence in support of helmets for preventing head injury and fatal injury". That cannot be true. Observational data cannot produce overwhelming evidence, as there is no control group, and confounding factors are difficult to separate. This meta-analysis only picked 6 studies, all in favor in helmets. Such cherry-picking is not science.
In 2003, this study was rebutted in a technical journal. http://people.aapt.net.au/~theyan/cycling/Accident%20Analysis%20Prevention%202.pdf The rebuttal concluded: "This examination concentrates on injury to the brain and shows that the meta-analysis and its included studies take no account of scientific knowledge of its mechanisms. Consequently, the choice of studies for the meta-analysis and the collection, treatment and interpretation of their data lack the guidance needed to distinguish injuries caused through fracture of the skull and by angular acceleration. It is shown that the design of helmets reflects a discredited theory of brain injury. The conclusions are that the meta-analysis does not provide scientific evidence that such helmets reduce serious injury to the brain, and the Australian policy of compulsory wearing lacks a basis of verified efficacy against brain injury." The study authors did not reply to the rebuttal, thus giving up on its claims.
In 2011, this study was re-analysed. http://www.cycle-helmets.com/elvik.pdf The re-analysis concluded: "This paper shows that the meta-analysis of bicycle helmet efficacy reported by Attewell, Glase, and McFadden (Accident Analysis and Prevention 2001, 345–352) was influenced by publication bias and time-trend bias that was not controlled for. As a result, the analysis reported inflated estimates of the effects of bicycle helmets". This should not be surprising, given the cherry-picking of favorable studies. A 2012 revision of this re-analysis confirms the publication and time-trend bias, and concludes that: "According to the new studies, no overall effect of bicycle helmets could be found when injuries to head, face or neck are considered as a whole." Yet it has been misrepresented in the article without mentioning the publication and time-trend bias.
Despite the conflicts of interests and the exposed flaws in the study, this study has been misrepresented in this article as if it was genuine science. This is misleading & deceptive. Such junk science should not quoted in Wikipedia as if it was genuine science. It may be a good illustration of propaganda from a government desperate to justify its controversial legislation, but it is not science.
Another misrepresentation using junk science relates to rotational injury. This is the current description in the rotational injury Section: "Curnow has suggested that the major causes of permanent intellectual disablement and death after head injury may be torsional forces leading to diffuse axonal injury(DAI), a form of injury which usual helmets cannot mitigate and may make worse.[79] However, Curnow's hypotheses are disputed" ...
This is highly biased and misleading. It denigrates the findings that helmets can increase rotational acceleration as "curnow's hypothesis". That is not true. This was first reported by research conducted in 1987 (mentioned in the previous paragraph), and confirmed by other studies. It cannot be denigrated as an hypothesis.
Another "study" is quoted, claiming that it proves that helmets reduce brain injury. It is described as follows: "An experimental study (to be published) by McIntoshet al. tested Curnow’s hypothesis that bicycle helmets increase angular acceleration during a crash, and found that they actually reduced both linear and angular acceleration by a considerable margin.[44][143] "
This is highly misleading as it fails to disclose that the study was about motorcycle helmets, not bicycle helmets. Additionally, this study was conducted at unrealistically low speeds (35 km/h) for motorcycles.
Such junk science has no place in Wikipedia. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Harvey4931 ( talk • contribs) 08:28, 19 May 2013 (UTC)
Tim C, Please do not use a straw man argument: misrepresenting my position in an attempt to denigrate it. This is derogatory. I have NEVER asserted that all studies funded by the government are untrustworthy.
It is standard practice to disclose funding and conflicts of interests. A conflict of interest is a warning signal, nothing more. It is disclosed because it is a relevant information. It does not make the material worthless. The denigrating statement that I do not accept junk science because "you don't like their findings" is another unfounded derogatory statement. Please do not make any further unfounded or derogatory accusations.
Flawed or misleading material should not be misrepresented as science. It is the unscientific methods used, as well as misleading statements not supported by the data, that makes them unworthy. The Attewell study has been rebutted twice, and has been shown to be influenced by publication bias and time-trend bias. There is a clear conflict of interest. The study makes impossible policy related claims. All this makes its claims not reliable. No tangible reason has been supplied to justify why such flawed and biased material should be presented as if it was genuine science.
A large edit was made by Tim C on the 19th of May. It was claimed that the changes were reverting other changes not discussed in the talk page. This is not true. Each of these change has been discussed upfront in the talk pages. This bulk edit also contained several unrelated stealth changes (Not first time deceptive changes occurred like that). Notably, a misleading description of his own study was put back yet again, despite being discussed many times in the talk pages. Additionally, the following description of a study recently added in rotational acceleration section was deleted.
Research done in Sweden in 1991 reported that "The non-shell helmet did in all trials grab the asphalt surface, which rotated the head together with the helmet. The consequences were in addition to the rotating of the head, a heavily bent and compressed neck, transmitted on through the whole test dummy body after the impact". An average angular acceleration of 20,800 rad/s-² for rotating the head was reported.
The next day Tim C added back the same study, using a misleading description that downplays the risks of rotational acceleration and neck injury for non-shell helmets, as if the version stealthily deleted never existed.
A 1993 study of bicycle helmet chin-strap forces in simulated oblique road surface impacts measured peak rotational acceleration in crash test dummy heads of 28000 rads/s2 for a non-shell helmet (also known as "soft-shell" helmets) in a 34km/h test. However, the investigators reported that "...[hard] shell helmets slid against the asphalt surface and there was only a slight angular movement of the head when the head was pushed upwards." Comparison tests on unhelmeted crash test heads were not performed.[143]
Those bulk deceptive changes have been reverted until the discussion is resolved. I trust that Tim C is capable of following his own rule of not making bulk changes without discussing them first. It would also be helpful if he stopped making misleading descriptions in the revision history while making stealth changes. Harvey4931 ( talk) 14:40, 28 May 2013 (UTC)