“Do your own research!”
I can’t tell you how many times during my career as a talk radio host that I was told that. It was often an exclamation point by a listener who disagreed with a position I had taken who was suggesting that there was opposing information available that would expand my knowledge.
Sometimes the critics were right. Yes, there were other facts I had not considered or was not aware of. That information helped me have a more balanced understanding of an issue.
However, frequently the statement was rooted in a rejection of established facts and a distrust of institutional knowledge. It was an attempt to undermine truth and replace it with misrepresentation.
The phrase “do your own research” originated with Milton William Cooper, a conspiracy theorist, radio broadcaster and author. He used the statement to spin conspiracy theories about everything from AIDS to extraterrestrial life.
The phrase caught on.
The University of Wisconsin-Madison professor Sedona Chinn studied the impact of the phrase “do your own research” during the pandemic. The report found that individuals supportive of the phrase “were more likely to be distrustful of scientists and more likely to believe misinformation about COVID-19.”
But this is not a simple matter.
Chinn said research shows, “that people who do more information seeking about politics are more civically engaged and people who do more information seeking about their health conditions have better treatment outcomes.” So, on the whole, it is “objectively good” to do your own research, Chinn says.
However, the question is whether individuals are searching for objective facts from credible sources or they are accessing potentially untrustworthy sources and seeking to reinforce preconceived and potentially faulty assumptions? For example, a quick Google search will turn up many examples of people making passionate arguments that the earth is flat, which is just patently false.
The United States is the world leader in technology and innovation. That is directly associated with research that is often conducted at colleges and universities and funded by the government.
That research is under siege from the Trump administration. For example, a Senate report released this week found that the administration cut cancer research funding by 31 percent for the first three months of the year. The National Cancer Institute lost more than $300 million. These are funds that were allocated by Congress.
Less research will not only slow innovation, but it will invite more pseudo research and quackery that is readily available online. I found a cartoon (while doing my research for this article) of a man sitting at a computer and he tells his wife, “Honey, come look! I’ve found some information all the world’s top scientists and doctors missed.”
We are not sheep, and it is important to be a healthy skeptic. For example, the American Medical Association Code of Ethics states that providing the best possible care to a patient “can include consulting other physicians for advice.” That is a reasonable approach to fact-finding.
However, when individuals seek to supplant institutional and proven knowledge with their own information because they “did their own research,” they run an increased risk of just being wrong.