Article 1: Chocolate Weight Loss Study's Authors Reveal Report Was Fake (UPDATE)

This article is from the Huffington Post and, before being corrected, describes a scientific
study where they tested whether chocolate had any positive effects on weight loss. There were
3 groups of 5 individuals each, one who did nothing and acted as a control, one who went on a
low carb diet, and one who went on a low carb diet and ate a small amount of chocolate each
day. The study found that the group which dieted and ate chocolate lost weight at the fastest
rate.
The issue is that the study was actually part of an elaborate prank by a researcher named
Johannes Bohannon to show how bad most news sites are at reporting scientific studies. There
were various issues with the study including the small sample size that could easily lead to a
false positive. They were also testing a variety of things in addition to weight loss such as
cholesterol levels, sodium levels, and more and so the chances of one of these things being
measured would be a false positive was greatly increased. The chance of one variable being a
false positive is 0.05 because p has to be less than 0.05. The chance of one of several variables
being a false positive is 1-((1-p)^n) where n is the number of variables being tested. So, as the
number of variables being tested increases, the chance of one variable being a false positive
increases.
Most people with a basic background in statistics and how scientific studies are
conducted would see this study as being vastly underpowered and not really capable of proving
much of anything. Despite these glaring issues, many outlets covered the study including the
Huffington Post, Daily Mail, Shape magazine, and more. Likely most of these websites were not
concerned with the validity of the science behind this study but with whether or not it could
generate clicks. Shockingly, most of these websites still have their original articles posted
without so much as a correction except for the Huffington Post. This prank shows the issue with
news outlets reporting on food studies without having the proper scientific background to
determine their validity.

Article 2: Hook Injuries Could Hamper Fish’s Ability to Feed

This article describes a study which sought out to see what detrimental effects hooking a
fish in the mouth with a fishing hook would have on the fish. The point of this was to determine
whether catch and release strategies to fish conservation are actually as benign as they portray.
The study found that hooking a fish in the mouth reduced suction for the fish and thus
reduces its ability to feed. This is because fish usually suck in water through their mouth in order
to capture small fast prey like shrimps or little fish. If suction is reduced, this strategy does not
work as effectively. They determined this by using computational fluid dynamics and high-speed
video to see how fast prey could get sucked up by the fish. They found that this speed was
greatly reduced for those fish which had been hooked (p<0.01).
The study also suggested that the shock associated with the fish being hooked had
other effects which could negatively affect them. This is because the computational fluid
analysis model did not account for all of the reduced feeding seen in the fish. The fight which
the fish put up while being caught exhausts the fish and lifting it out of the water afterwards
essentially suffocates it for a short period of time. This results in increased stress levels for the
fish, likely resulting in a decreased willingness to feed. Melissa Thompson, the researcher
behind the study, suggested that trying to keep the fish in the water while you remove the hook
could be beneficial towards the fish.
The study seems like it does a good job of showing that hook injuries cause a decreased
ability to feed in fish. The evidence behind the stress associated with being hooked resulting in
decreased feeding was a little less concrete but seems to make sense. The study also notes
that it does not actually determine whether this decreased effect on feeding leads to a
decreased effect on survival in the wild, though it would make sense if it did.

Article 3: Canadian wildlife populations dropping in 'global biodiversity crisis': WWF

The article presents a pretty dire state in regards to populations of species and
biodiversity in Canada and around the world. The populations of species have dropped by 60
percent in the last four decades. While Canada’s drops in population are not quite this bad, they
have also dropped by 43 percent for mammals and 34 percent for fish. These statistics come
from the World Wildlife Foundation (WWF) and the organization wants more environmental
regulations from the Canadian government in order to curb these changes. These would include
creating more protected areas for animals and a movement away from fossil fuels towards
renewable sources of energy. The Canadian government will put in new land protections by
2020 which when combined are the size of Alberta.
This article shows the urgency in protecting animal populations in Canada and around
the world. As human populations continue to increase, there will be less and less habitat for
animals to live in. The article states that currently, only one-quarter of the land on the earth is
free from human impacts and that this number will reduce to 10 percent by 2050. Furthermore,
we will also put a larger pressure on these populations through practices such as hunting and
fishing. Since so much of our lives depends on the natural environment, especially when it
comes to food and other resources, it is important to protect these natural ecosystems to
maintain the stability of the planet.

Sources

Article 1

Huffington Post. (2015) ​Chocolate Weight Loss Study's Authors Reveal Report Was Fake
(UPDATE).​
[​https://www.huffingtonpost.in/2015/05/29/chocolate-weight-loss_n_6975422.html​]

Bohannon, J. (2015) ​I Fooled Millions Into Thinking Chocolate Helps Weight Loss. Here's How.
io9.
[​https://io9.gizmodo.com/i-fooled-millions-into-thinking-chocolate-helps-weight-1707251800​]
Article 2

CBC (2018) ​Hook injuries could hamper fish's ability to feed.​

[​https://www.cbc.ca/radio/quirks/oct-27-2018-neanderthal-nursing-antarctica-s-singing-snows-fis
h-and-hook-injuries-a-1.4878288/hook-injuries-could-hamper-fish-s-ability-to-feed-1.4878299​]

Thompson M, Wassenbergh S V, Rogers S M, Seamone S G, Higham T E. (2018)

Angling-induced injuries have a negative impact on suction feeding performance and
hydrodynamics in marine shiner perch, Cymatogaster aggregata. ​Journal of Experimental
Biology.
[​http://jeb.biologists.org/content/221/19/jeb180935​]

Article 3

CTV News (2018) ​Canadian wildlife populations dropping in 'global biodiversity crisis': WWF.
[​https://www.ctvnews.ca/sci-tech/canadian-wildlife-populations-dropping-in-global-biodiversity-cri
sis-wwf-1.4155457​]