An article on FOXNews talks about a study published in The Age. The study is believable and seems to be accurate but the title of the article is pretty deceiving. Some people, usually just skim through these articles; I know sometimes I’ll only read the title and then move on. If someone were to read this article, they may be fooled and in the future while getting groceries or something may think “Oh, I read somewhere that raisins make you happier; I’ll get some raisins.” Sure, I guess it may be good advertising for Sun-Maid Raisins, Inc., but this research is not saying that eating raisins can cure depression. On the contrary, the subjects are simply observing the raisin. In the study, the subjects held the raisin and examined it. They rolled it in their fingers and put it to their ears and looked at it very closely. And after reading the article, a raisin is not even necessary to get results; it could be practically any inanimate object. They use the raisin to learn meditation which can make you aware of your physical surroundings and your own thoughts.
This form of therapy is called Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy, or MBCT, which combines the more well known cognitive behavior therapy with meditation-like skills. The researchers claim that this is a more effective way than just simply using cognitive behavior therapy because it helps to change your thoughts and personal relationship about something in your life that may be provoking the depression. Whereas cognitive behavior therapy is used to make a person ponder over what in their life depresses them and in what ways they can come up with a solution to change it, meditation skills help the person to control their thoughts before their thoughts control them.
The article does include the primary source in which to find the study and if it is an effective experiment, they would have had to use a long term lab experiment to test the subject’s depression as opposed to a questionnaire or a survey because the participants might just answer in a socially acceptable way. Also, they would have had to use randomization to rule out the possible biases such as age, social status, etc. The author of the article should have used another title, relating more to the topic. The topic is not raisins, but Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy. Although the title that they have may seem more likely to catch the reader’s attention, it does a poor job in representing the content of the article.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,446166,00.html
