Returning to the topic of Channel 4's Bringing up Baby series (see Bringing Up Baby - theatre or bad science? and Bringing Up Baby - update), the Ofcom judgement on complaints about has just come out. Broadcast Bulletin Issue number 98 - 03|12|07 concludes "Not in Breach".
I think it's a complete whitewash. Others will no doubt find further specifics, but I noticed two points immediately. Firstly, the issue of mentor Claire Verity's qualifications (since shown to be questionable) is dismissed on a technicality: that since the programme made no reference to professional qualifications, audiences were not misled. Never mind the strong implication and not unreasonable assumption that if someone turns up on TV as a babycare "mentor" and "maternity nurse", they would have qualifications for that role.
Secondly, Ofcom closes ranks with the still unnamed experts who advised the programme - "a senior psychologist", "a neurologist", "a GP" and a "senior consultant paediatrician" - and appears not to have taken wider advice, or any notice of the many criticisms from professional childcare organisations, on the current consensus about developmental psychology: that Truby King's tenets such as minimal cuddling and making no eye contact are not merely outdated, but wildly wrong.
The Ofcom ruling furthermore upholds Truby King's methods on grounds of mere established historical authority, because of being "previously published and well-known books and theories ... in the public domain and legal". Ofcom describes its starting point as "that a programme which explores and discusses these approaches cannot in itself be problematic, so long as the broadcaster ensures that the material is put in context and that the audience is fully informed ... The methods were put in an historical perspective". This is not true. We never saw the full background of the Truby King's colonial-era nationalist eugenic control-freakery that viewed maternal affection as "a dangerous indulgence".
Showing posts with label Ch4. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ch4. Show all posts
Wednesday, 5 December 2007
Tuesday, 2 October 2007
Bringing Up Baby - update
Channel 4's Bringing Up Baby (see my earlier Bringing Up Baby - theatre or bad science?) had its second episode this evening. Meanwhile, on the Channel 4 forum, the commissioning editor Hamish Mykura has responded to criticisms.
It appears that various experts were consulted, and the couples in the programme were free to modify the methods they chose, and the Ch4 microsite confirms this: As our expert Harvey Marcovitch points out, "it's important to be aware that the three methodologies [used in the programmes] were modified somewhat in light of modern medical opinion".
Nevertheless, the light of modern medical opinion doesn't come across very prominently. Hamish Mykura writes: "We did not intend to promote any particular theory, but hoped this would be an interesting way to stimulate a debate on the pros and cons of each method". This reeks of manufactured controversy. The bottom line is that while parenting techniques are subject to discussion and revision, there is no need to stimulate a debate about the Truby King method any more than there's need to stimulate a debate about the pros and cons of sending children down the mines. It's not only discredited, but advocates practices that are now generally agreed to be damaging to infant development. It is not responsible to offer it non-judgmentally as a viable option to try out.
The same goes for the Channel 4 microsite. If you believe the summary at Which is the best method for bringing up baby?, the only critics are "parents who like spontaneity and flexibility" and believers in Attachment Theory (which they don't bother to explain). Nor is there anything in the Pros & Cons section reflecting the body of research over the last few decades into the known effects of infant isolation - one of the Ch4 forum posters linked to a taster here - and this is the most potent argument against Truby King's ideas.
Addendum: the Nursing & Midwifery Council has just published a complaint - NMC response to Channel 4 series, Bringing up Baby - about one of the mentors' use of an unrecognised job description, "maternity nurse".
Addendum #2: from the Times, Maternity expert Claire Verity is asked to stay away from Baby Show as mothers threaten protest. The fallout from the unpopularity of her advice has led to a cancellation of an invitation to appear at the forthcoming Baby Show at Earls Court.
Addendum #3: from the Times, October 27th. TV’s toughest nanny and the string of qualifications that do not exist, one of a number of newspaper reports revealing further difficulties with Claire Verity's fitness to give babycare advice. Channel 4 are launching an enquiry.
While this is interesting, it's too late and not terribly relevant. There should have been investigation long since, purely on grounds of the criticisms that were being made, and ignored by the programme makers, after the first episode in the series.
It appears that various experts were consulted, and the couples in the programme were free to modify the methods they chose, and the Ch4 microsite confirms this: As our expert Harvey Marcovitch points out, "it's important to be aware that the three methodologies [used in the programmes] were modified somewhat in light of modern medical opinion".
Nevertheless, the light of modern medical opinion doesn't come across very prominently. Hamish Mykura writes: "We did not intend to promote any particular theory, but hoped this would be an interesting way to stimulate a debate on the pros and cons of each method". This reeks of manufactured controversy. The bottom line is that while parenting techniques are subject to discussion and revision, there is no need to stimulate a debate about the Truby King method any more than there's need to stimulate a debate about the pros and cons of sending children down the mines. It's not only discredited, but advocates practices that are now generally agreed to be damaging to infant development. It is not responsible to offer it non-judgmentally as a viable option to try out.
The same goes for the Channel 4 microsite. If you believe the summary at Which is the best method for bringing up baby?, the only critics are "parents who like spontaneity and flexibility" and believers in Attachment Theory (which they don't bother to explain). Nor is there anything in the Pros & Cons section reflecting the body of research over the last few decades into the known effects of infant isolation - one of the Ch4 forum posters linked to a taster here - and this is the most potent argument against Truby King's ideas.
Addendum: the Nursing & Midwifery Council has just published a complaint - NMC response to Channel 4 series, Bringing up Baby - about one of the mentors' use of an unrecognised job description, "maternity nurse".
Addendum #2: from the Times, Maternity expert Claire Verity is asked to stay away from Baby Show as mothers threaten protest. The fallout from the unpopularity of her advice has led to a cancellation of an invitation to appear at the forthcoming Baby Show at Earls Court.
Addendum #3: from the Times, October 27th. TV’s toughest nanny and the string of qualifications that do not exist, one of a number of newspaper reports revealing further difficulties with Claire Verity's fitness to give babycare advice. Channel 4 are launching an enquiry.
While this is interesting, it's too late and not terribly relevant. There should have been investigation long since, purely on grounds of the criticisms that were being made, and ignored by the programme makers, after the first episode in the series.
Thursday, 27 September 2007
Media and bad science #1 - correction
As a major news medium, the BBC has a vast influence on the dissemination and perceived validation of information. Like most media outlets, it makes mistakes. How good is it at correcting them?
I've had mixed experiences. Generally the front-line 'techie' editors are excellent; I've had prompt corrections over things like the name of a mineral or an inaccurate explanation of the Space Shuttle reentry manoeuvre. I had a very prompt reply and cordial discussion with Nick Higham over my comments on his When science and journalism collide, which I recommend as an even-handed analysis of many of the issues that drive the divide between what scientists do and how the press reports it.
However, my predominant impression is that over matters of science, the BBC has a deep resistance to correction. My particular idée fixe is its reportage of an alleged Three headed frog, a stupid story that persists on the BBC website after three years, despite my repeated attempts to draw their attention to my debunking of it as a simple case of multiple amplexus (i.e. frog mating grip). If any herpetologists are reading this and you agree with me, the complaints page is thisaway.
Another example was the saga of its coverage of the alternative medical technique of craniosacral therapy. In its original form in 2004 the text, by Jacqueline Young, stated "US osteopath William Garner Sutherland ... found that the cranial bones (the skull bones encasing the brain) weren't fused in adulthood, as was widely believed, but had a cycle of slight involuntary movement". This is nonsense: there is no evidence that cranial bones move, and practitioners don't even agree on what they feel when given the same patient (see Quackwatch and Bad Science). All I asked of them was that they report this is a belief rather than a fact.
I complained in October 2004. After several months I was told the article's writer "was aware of the situation" and that the issue is being "debated by osteopaths in their professional journal. She is currently investigating and depending on her findings the article will be re-worded". After a year the article was changed to say "Sutherland believed that the cranial bones ... weren't fused in adulthood" but it was still biased by omission of counterevidence, unlike the Channel 4 counterpart.
Finally, after a site overhaul in February 2007, they did something. Craniosacral therapy is now included under the Osteopathy section, which says "Practitioners claim to be able to feel the ebb and flow of this fluid, but sceptics reject this and say there's no good evidence for movement of the cranial bones after infancy". Credit where it's due: that's all I asked. But it shouldn't take three years to get it done.
At the time, as a wider issue, I commented on the BBC website's whole coverage of complementary medicine (again, in contrast to Channel 4). You can read the full details here, but the gist is that I argued that the whole section - for failing to offer the context of mainstream opinion - was in breach of its then Producer's Guidelines on impartiality, which stated "Due impartiality lies at the heart of the BBC. It is a core value and no area of programming is exempt from it".
The thrust of the Complaints Unit's reply was that it was outside their remit, unless there was a case to be argued for irresponsibility or potential harm. This, they said, is because the BBC's duty of due impartiality only applies to "matters of public policy or of political and industrial controversy". This seemed bizarre, and I queried it. Didn't their guideline say "no area of programming is exempt"? But no, they replied, the duty of due impartiality "applies to all areas only in the sense that no area of programming is exempt from it when dealing with matters where due impartiality is required"! This duty derives, they said, from section 5 of the Agreement associated with the BBC Charter.
In short, despite apparent stated commitment to overall impartiality, the small print is that it applies selectively and that there is nothing you can actually hold them to to enforce it outside that selective area.
As I described in 2005 - OK to promote vegetables via nonsense? - I had similar problems with Ofcom, the UK independent regulator for telecommunications. Having noticed in their archives a failed Accuracy complaint ("not in breach/out of remit") about Gillian McKeith's You are What You Eat, I asked if any part of their Code covered scientific inaccuracies in such programmes. No, they said. Viewers being 'misled' is in their brief where it relates to advertising or news bulletins, but "In matters of science it is invariably the case that there are a range of views on any number of issues ... Ofcom's primary concern as a regulator is not for scientific accuracy in the face of alternate views, but rather that care has been taken by the broadcaster to avoid harm". Here are the Harm and Offence and Due Impartiality and Due Accuracy and Undue Prominence of Views and Opinions sections of their Broadcasting Code, you find there is nothing enforcing accuracy, and impartiality only applies to "matters of political or industrial controversy and matters relating to current public policy".
To sum up, if you see bad science aired on UK television, you will run into serious difficulties in getting complaints to stick if you're arguing faults of accuracy or balance. You need to argue harm.
I've had mixed experiences. Generally the front-line 'techie' editors are excellent; I've had prompt corrections over things like the name of a mineral or an inaccurate explanation of the Space Shuttle reentry manoeuvre. I had a very prompt reply and cordial discussion with Nick Higham over my comments on his When science and journalism collide, which I recommend as an even-handed analysis of many of the issues that drive the divide between what scientists do and how the press reports it.
However, my predominant impression is that over matters of science, the BBC has a deep resistance to correction. My particular idée fixe is its reportage of an alleged Three headed frog, a stupid story that persists on the BBC website after three years, despite my repeated attempts to draw their attention to my debunking of it as a simple case of multiple amplexus (i.e. frog mating grip). If any herpetologists are reading this and you agree with me, the complaints page is thisaway.
Another example was the saga of its coverage of the alternative medical technique of craniosacral therapy. In its original form in 2004 the text, by Jacqueline Young, stated "US osteopath William Garner Sutherland ... found that the cranial bones (the skull bones encasing the brain) weren't fused in adulthood, as was widely believed, but had a cycle of slight involuntary movement". This is nonsense: there is no evidence that cranial bones move, and practitioners don't even agree on what they feel when given the same patient (see Quackwatch and Bad Science). All I asked of them was that they report this is a belief rather than a fact.
I complained in October 2004. After several months I was told the article's writer "was aware of the situation" and that the issue is being "debated by osteopaths in their professional journal. She is currently investigating and depending on her findings the article will be re-worded". After a year the article was changed to say "Sutherland believed that the cranial bones ... weren't fused in adulthood" but it was still biased by omission of counterevidence, unlike the Channel 4 counterpart.
Finally, after a site overhaul in February 2007, they did something. Craniosacral therapy is now included under the Osteopathy section, which says "Practitioners claim to be able to feel the ebb and flow of this fluid, but sceptics reject this and say there's no good evidence for movement of the cranial bones after infancy". Credit where it's due: that's all I asked. But it shouldn't take three years to get it done.
At the time, as a wider issue, I commented on the BBC website's whole coverage of complementary medicine (again, in contrast to Channel 4). You can read the full details here, but the gist is that I argued that the whole section - for failing to offer the context of mainstream opinion - was in breach of its then Producer's Guidelines on impartiality, which stated "Due impartiality lies at the heart of the BBC. It is a core value and no area of programming is exempt from it".
The thrust of the Complaints Unit's reply was that it was outside their remit, unless there was a case to be argued for irresponsibility or potential harm. This, they said, is because the BBC's duty of due impartiality only applies to "matters of public policy or of political and industrial controversy". This seemed bizarre, and I queried it. Didn't their guideline say "no area of programming is exempt"? But no, they replied, the duty of due impartiality "applies to all areas only in the sense that no area of programming is exempt from it when dealing with matters where due impartiality is required"! This duty derives, they said, from section 5 of the Agreement associated with the BBC Charter.
In short, despite apparent stated commitment to overall impartiality, the small print is that it applies selectively and that there is nothing you can actually hold them to to enforce it outside that selective area.
As I described in 2005 - OK to promote vegetables via nonsense? - I had similar problems with Ofcom, the UK independent regulator for telecommunications. Having noticed in their archives a failed Accuracy complaint ("not in breach/out of remit") about Gillian McKeith's You are What You Eat, I asked if any part of their Code covered scientific inaccuracies in such programmes. No, they said. Viewers being 'misled' is in their brief where it relates to advertising or news bulletins, but "In matters of science it is invariably the case that there are a range of views on any number of issues ... Ofcom's primary concern as a regulator is not for scientific accuracy in the face of alternate views, but rather that care has been taken by the broadcaster to avoid harm". Here are the Harm and Offence and Due Impartiality and Due Accuracy and Undue Prominence of Views and Opinions sections of their Broadcasting Code, you find there is nothing enforcing accuracy, and impartiality only applies to "matters of political or industrial controversy and matters relating to current public policy".
To sum up, if you see bad science aired on UK television, you will run into serious difficulties in getting complaints to stick if you're arguing faults of accuracy or balance. You need to argue harm.
Wednesday, 26 September 2007
Bringing Up Baby - theatre or bad science?
Yesterday, Channel 4 screened the first episode of Bringing Up Baby, a series which purports to compare three childcare theories - Truby King, Dr Spock, and the Continuum Concept - by testing them in practice. I say "purports" because these days it's anyone's guess whether shows are real or to some extent theatrical contrivance. Check out, for instance, the revelations that Bear Grylls in Born Survivor, for reasons of health and safety, had a deal of help in surviving; and that in Dumped, for the same reasons, the participants were living on a simulated rubbish dump.
Bringing Up Baby is already attracting a deal of comment because one of its mentors, the nurse and celebrity consultant Claire Verity, aka The Baby Guru, is an exponent of the methods advocated by Sir Frederic Truby King. While his career was highly worthy in respect of raising consciousness about child welfare and lowering infant mortality, his agenda was essentially nationalistic, imperialist and driven by eugenics, and he was at the core of a celebrity following largely based on ideas of racial improvement. The fetishistic detail of this 'Plunket system' (named after Victoria Plunket, an early patron) raised eyebrows even in its time; Dr Helen Mayo, head of Adelaide's voluntary infant welfare movement, wrote "The chief drawback of the Plunket system is the fanaticism of the nurses; it becomes practically a religious cult with them". (See A History of Australia, New Zealand, and the Pacific). Indeed, the biography at the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography describes Truby King himself as rather disorganised, and says the obsessive organisation came from the system's interpreters.
The controversial aspect in relation to Bringing Up Baby is Truby King's childcare method. Living at Scarba (PDF), an account of an Australian childcare home, describes it: Early 20th century childcare theory and practice was marked by a desire to 'grow superior children'. In the early 1920s the theories of Frederic Truby King (New Zealand) and John B. Watson (USA), who were both initially involved in the study of animals, dominated infant care theory. In general their theories encouraged parents or carers to train children to become independent, self-reliant, self-controlled and unemotional. It was thought that the removal of love and affection would enable children to become industrious, enterprising and resourceful ... Truby King advocated for children to have strict routines and regimented lives – habit training – which included regular, if not obsessive, times for feeding, exercise and sleeping. Furthermore, Truby King, along with other child experts, believed babies both preferred and benefited from solitude.
The regime, then, involves no touching, minimal eye contact, leaving the infant alone for long periods, and so on. This goes radically against the modern view, informed by knowledge of infant neurobiological development, that early mother-infant bonding is crucial. See Bonding and Attachment in Maltreated Children: Consequences of Emotional Neglect in Childhood, which stresses the importance of activities such as "holding, rocking, singing, feeding, gazing, kissing, and other nurturing behaviors ... the most important factor in creating attachment is positive physical contact". Against this, Truby King's system has been long discredited.
As explored in this article reprinted at The Children's Project - Promoting Resilience: Changing Concepts of Parenting and Child Care - the history of changing theories on childcare is an interesting and worthwhile topic that deserves television airtime. Nevertheless, the ethics of testing on babies a system that is based on an archaic and harmful premise is questionable to say the least. The Channel 4 Family forum topic is currently quite busy on the topic, and the view of Claire Verity / Truby King methods is uniformly hostile.
OK, so maybe I'm being naive about TV production, and maybe we're all being sucked into a non-controversy about a programme that's obviously a construct to dramatise these theories (Truby King vs Spock vs Continuum played out as caricatures: Control Freak vs Dated-but-Laidback vs Drippy New Age). I hope so, but we should be told if this is the case (the issue of faked TV scenarios is currently a hot topic in itself). Claire Verity, however, appears to be serious, and whether the scenario is real or concocted, I think it's irresponsible for Channel 4 to publicise a theory that's so out of tune not merely with childcare fashion, but with established developmental science.
I'm pleased to see that Social Baby, the weblog of Helen and Clive Dorman (authors and co-founders of The Children's Project), is already well on the case, arguing that the use of the Truby King method may even be a breach of the Unicef Convention on the Rights of the Child. They in fact were contacted, when the programme makers were looking for proponents of the method, and provided plenty of evidence that it was discredited and plain damaging - but the programme went ahead anyway. The whole thing was filmed months back, of course - in May 2007, according to a Birmingham Sunday Mercury piece - so complaints are little belated.
Bringing Up Baby is already attracting a deal of comment because one of its mentors, the nurse and celebrity consultant Claire Verity, aka The Baby Guru, is an exponent of the methods advocated by Sir Frederic Truby King. While his career was highly worthy in respect of raising consciousness about child welfare and lowering infant mortality, his agenda was essentially nationalistic, imperialist and driven by eugenics, and he was at the core of a celebrity following largely based on ideas of racial improvement. The fetishistic detail of this 'Plunket system' (named after Victoria Plunket, an early patron) raised eyebrows even in its time; Dr Helen Mayo, head of Adelaide's voluntary infant welfare movement, wrote "The chief drawback of the Plunket system is the fanaticism of the nurses; it becomes practically a religious cult with them". (See A History of Australia, New Zealand, and the Pacific). Indeed, the biography at the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography describes Truby King himself as rather disorganised, and says the obsessive organisation came from the system's interpreters.
The controversial aspect in relation to Bringing Up Baby is Truby King's childcare method. Living at Scarba (PDF), an account of an Australian childcare home, describes it: Early 20th century childcare theory and practice was marked by a desire to 'grow superior children'. In the early 1920s the theories of Frederic Truby King (New Zealand) and John B. Watson (USA), who were both initially involved in the study of animals, dominated infant care theory. In general their theories encouraged parents or carers to train children to become independent, self-reliant, self-controlled and unemotional. It was thought that the removal of love and affection would enable children to become industrious, enterprising and resourceful ... Truby King advocated for children to have strict routines and regimented lives – habit training – which included regular, if not obsessive, times for feeding, exercise and sleeping. Furthermore, Truby King, along with other child experts, believed babies both preferred and benefited from solitude.
The regime, then, involves no touching, minimal eye contact, leaving the infant alone for long periods, and so on. This goes radically against the modern view, informed by knowledge of infant neurobiological development, that early mother-infant bonding is crucial. See Bonding and Attachment in Maltreated Children: Consequences of Emotional Neglect in Childhood, which stresses the importance of activities such as "holding, rocking, singing, feeding, gazing, kissing, and other nurturing behaviors ... the most important factor in creating attachment is positive physical contact". Against this, Truby King's system has been long discredited.
As explored in this article reprinted at The Children's Project - Promoting Resilience: Changing Concepts of Parenting and Child Care - the history of changing theories on childcare is an interesting and worthwhile topic that deserves television airtime. Nevertheless, the ethics of testing on babies a system that is based on an archaic and harmful premise is questionable to say the least. The Channel 4 Family forum topic is currently quite busy on the topic, and the view of Claire Verity / Truby King methods is uniformly hostile.
OK, so maybe I'm being naive about TV production, and maybe we're all being sucked into a non-controversy about a programme that's obviously a construct to dramatise these theories (Truby King vs Spock vs Continuum played out as caricatures: Control Freak vs Dated-but-Laidback vs Drippy New Age). I hope so, but we should be told if this is the case (the issue of faked TV scenarios is currently a hot topic in itself). Claire Verity, however, appears to be serious, and whether the scenario is real or concocted, I think it's irresponsible for Channel 4 to publicise a theory that's so out of tune not merely with childcare fashion, but with established developmental science.
I'm pleased to see that Social Baby, the weblog of Helen and Clive Dorman (authors and co-founders of The Children's Project), is already well on the case, arguing that the use of the Truby King method may even be a breach of the Unicef Convention on the Rights of the Child. They in fact were contacted, when the programme makers were looking for proponents of the method, and provided plenty of evidence that it was discredited and plain damaging - but the programme went ahead anyway. The whole thing was filmed months back, of course - in May 2007, according to a Birmingham Sunday Mercury piece - so complaints are little belated.
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