The Role of Conflicts of Interest in Developing Popular Understanding of Public Health Risks and the Desire for Political Change
Posted: 29 Mar 2010
Abstract
Scientific research has been increasingly involved in justifying public health policy changes relating to the use and taxation of tobacco, alcohol, pharmaceuticals, and food. In response, industries selling such products have developed research programs intended to prove they pose limited public health risks. Such research has historically been likely to find results palatable to funders, spurring intensive research regarding how financial conflicts of interest influence research findings. However, little research has considered whether this conflicted research is effective in shifting popular perceptions about what constitutes public health risks. We investigate how research on tobacco and pharmaceuticals is perceived relative to other public health risks in the context of eight training workshops designed to improve the understanding of scientific research. Workshops focus on the critical appraisal of research findings, including a discussion of what constitutes bias in research, and enroll 20-30 clinicians, consumer advocates, journalists, or parents of school-age children in each session. The workshop curriculum presents and critiques research studies. We analyze transcripts of the sessions for content regarding initial perceptions of health risks and assessments of credibility, and the extent to which beliefs change in the course of the workshop. Our findings suggest the extent to which conflicted research is embedded in popular perceptions of health risks.
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