{"id":2274,"date":"2019-03-06T11:26:23","date_gmt":"2019-03-05T22:26:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.waikato.ac.nz\/bioblog\/?p=2274"},"modified":"2019-03-06T11:29:50","modified_gmt":"2019-03-05T22:29:50","slug":"a-critical-analysis-of-the-wilyman-thesis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.waikato.ac.nz\/bioblog\/2019\/03\/a-critical-analysis-of-the-wilyman-thesis\/","title":{"rendered":"a new critical analysis of the Wilyman thesis"},"content":{"rendered":"

A few years back, University of Wollongong student Judy Wilyman received a PhD for a thesis that claimed to offer a “critical analysis of the Australian government’s rationale for its vaccination policy.<\/a>”<\/p>\n

Both the thesis, and the processes at Wollongong in relation to PhD study and examination, attracted a considerable amount of scrutiny and criticism (see here<\/a> and here<\/a>, for example). Criticism that was well-deserved: you don’t expect a PhD thesis on a public health initiative to promote a conspiracy-theory ideation<\/a>, for example, or to have such a superficial understanding of germ theory<\/a> and the functioning of the immune system.<\/p>\n

Now a group of researchers has subjected Wilyman’s thesis to the sort of scrutiny that it should have received during the examination process (Wiley, Leask, Burgess & McIntyre, 2019<\/a>). They did this due to concerns that<\/p>\n

some non-vaccinating parents are considering the thesis in their decision-making,<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

and that health care providers might be unaware of its nature.<\/p>\n

Wiley and her colleagues noted that “the thesis involved no primary research” – but did involve a\u00a0non-systematic<\/em> review of the literature. They read and analysed the document and identified a number of significant deficiencies in the work:<\/p>\n