For how long are we to endure this pseudo-science?
1. If you take a big enough sample of the population and 1 factor (breastfeeding or bottle-feeding) you can make all the connections you want. What about all the other factors to the equation?
2. The sample population in this case were people born in the 1920s and 1930s. Presumably these people have also experience the war and its impact on social mobility.
3. err, actually it's not significant at all, says researcher!
Richard Martin, reader in clinical epidemiology at the University of Bristol, who led the new research, admitted that the findings should be treated with caution as there was only a small difference between the chances of moving up a social class - with 58% of those who were breast-fed moving up a social class compared with 50% of those who were bottle-fed.
4. What's intelligence?
"One of the most consistent findings in the published literature on the long-term impact of infant-feeding is that breastfeeding is associated with improved neurocognitive development, which could influence future educational and occupational success and hence social mobility" the researchers write.
err, no actually! This is today's ideology and nostalgia. There are associated benefits with breastfeeding, although for up to 6 months not over, but intelligence is a far more complex quality. This fantasy comes from the study published on Lancet (not a very serious journal, I'm afraid) claiming that breast-feeding increased IQ by five points in preterm babies. However,
'research published last year by the Medical Research Council indicated that the reason breastfed babies were more intelligent was because of other factors such as a more stimulating home environment.'
The problem is that IQ does not tell you whether a person is intelligent. I'm afraid intelligence (which means linking together) is not quantifiable and has many different aspects. The attempt to measure one's intelligence is clearly an indication of idiocy.
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