In 1998, an uncontrolled study of several autistic children suggested that required vaccinations administered to children could play a role in the onset of autism. Its conclusions were refuted by scientists, however, and were later retracted. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention maintains that there is no evidence of harm brought about such vaccinations.
Despite this, and despite overwhelming evidence that autism stems from genetics, parents of autistic children have begun pointing to vaccinations as the cause of their kids’ autism. Celebrities such as Jenny McCarthy have hopped on the bandwagon too. The actress, whose son is autistic, recently appeared on Larry King Live and held a discussion with three pediatricians who refuted her claims. Still, she managed to plant doubts in many people’s heads. Several days ago, concerned parents on Long Island approached Nassau County legislators in an effort to pass a “philosophical exemption” law that would allow some children to skip the required immunizations.
Why do these parents ignore some pieces of evidence and cling to others? Do they believe they are smarter than the scientists? Why are they willing to risk leaving their children vulnerable to contagious diseases? Is Jenny McCarthy really the person we should be relying on to provide us with scientific data? They’re all important questions that can be taken on from a social psychological perspective.
When we look at it from a social psychological standpoint, it becomes easier to understand how these parents could come to such conclusions. In any given situation, the information available to us for judgment is usually deceptive or difficult to understand. A lot of the time, it is also unrepresentative or biased in some way. Another problem is that, typically, not all the information we need to make an accurate judgment is present.
One way of collecting information is through anecdotal evidence—personal information that we gather in an unsystematic fashion. This is information is experienced and absorbed by us firsthand. While this information is highly salient and usually fairly easy to remember, this does not imply that it is accurate. In Jenny McCarthy’s case, for example, she remembers that her son was vaccinated at around the same time his autistic symptoms first appeared. In her mind, the experience of taking her child in for his vaccinations—an experience that already had a bad stigma in her mind, as it can be traumatizing for both parent and child—is directly tied to her memory of the onset of his symptoms. They both occurred around the same time, they were both bad—surely, they must be related. This type of reasoning led McCarthy to establish a causal link where there should be none. She was even quoted as saying, “I believe that parents’ anecdotal information is science-based information.” Jenny clearly had trouble waking up for her 9am social psych class.
But what first gave McCarthy the idea that these vaccinations were the cause? And why do so many parents follow her lead? One theory is the confirmation bias—the tendency to seek out information that confirms our beliefs and disregard information that refutes it. When the results of the original vaccination study first broke, McCarthy finally had the answer she was looking for—her son’s autism had been solved. Since then, she has managed to gather a following of parents who follow the same line of reasoning. It becomes considerably easier for them to ignore the scientific evidence disconfirming their beliefs when there is a plethora of information being produced—reliable or not—that supports their claims.
Sources: Newsday, 4/29/08; USA Today, 4/16/08
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