I love it when things are empirically validated!

Empirical validation means that someone somewhere did some kind of study and found that the resulting information, within a good range of certainty,  supports or does not support something that people want to know such as global warming is real and trickle down economics doesn't work.

Here are some of the things that have been empirically validated that I personally think are really cool

1).  Marijuana is not a gateway drug.  Actually, you can't prove a negative so what is really empirically validated is that there is no evidence to support that pot is a gateway drug.   So smoke away.  Unless you are a teenager.  It is also empirically validated that early use of marijuana is correlated with development of schizophrenia as an adult.  Of course corelation does not equal causation, but why take the risk?  Put down that joint, you preteen kids who shouldn't be smoking anything anyway!

2).  Complaining is good for you.  It helps you to get things out of your head and examine them.  It actually lets other people know that they aren't alone in their dissatisfaction and that can lead to camaraderie and connection.  Of course, maybe t's not such a good idea to complain about your boss to your boss.  But complaining about your boss to your co-workers lets you feel more in charge of the situation and your feelings and can lead to finding solutions or some resolution to manage the situation differently. But be aware that...

3).  Classic brainstorming doesn't work very well.  Group brainstorming is having everyone bring all their ideas to the table and then have everyone mull them around.  Everyone is supposed to let lose with all of their ideas no matter how crazy.  The problem is, people are not necessarily going to let everyone hear that their best solution is to have a singing gorilla deliver a telegram to let someone know they are fired, or that the thing to do with all those extra donated office chairs, is to paint them and auction them off at the next dinner dance. (That one was my idea that no one liked).  People don't want to expose themselves , and people think that, when they are in a group, it is someone else's job.

I could come up with a billion things that have some kind of empirical evidence.  Some things are useful. some are not.  It is also possible to go overboard.  In my field everyone is all about best practice.  That's great, but it means that some types of interventions are discredited and others are put on a pedestal.  Other types of treatment become so obsessed with being done correctly that they become lost as viable options.  People have let me know that Play Therapy doesn't work because it has not been empirically validated.  So does that mean that everything that has not had a university research-based study done to prove that it works, actually is ineffective?

You also must look at who did the research and what is their motivation to do it.  Did a cigarette company do research to support that smoking actually does make you look cool?  You also have to look at risks outweighing benefits.  Are you willing to look cool at the risk of developing cancer?

Also, don't forget that correlation does not equal causation thing. Kids who love to read have been highly correlated with having parents who own lots of books.  However, that doesn't mean that if you want your kids to read,  you should fill your living room wall with shelves of encyclopedias and romance novels. Remember that things being correlated does not mean that they is any relationship to causality.  I love to read, but I don't ever remember seeing my Dad's book collection and thinking "Oh, maybe books are fun!"

So, be aware that some of the thing that are accepted as true may be proved wrong through research (like telling kids they are smart all  the time is just settiig them up to be neurotic about failure)  Some research is crap (like the guy who found that vaccines cause autism admitted to faking data and outcomes), And finding out something is empirically validated, doesn't necessarily make it better than something else or mean it's good for everyone. I probably wouldn't take my 98 year old grandmother for her yearly mammogram, or tell her to quit smoking even though those things are absolutely proven to have positive benefits,

In the long run, research is important to make life better and make thing work for the good of all. Now, can someone please empirically validate that binge eating chocolate chip cookies while watching a Harry Potter marathon in you pajamas is actually good for you?