It merely means that a particular person perceives something as the truth. Subjective experience, however, doesn’t mean that something is objectively true. Science is a methodology that is designed to find the objective truth, which will remain the truth regardless of individual experiences. Therefore, according to the best practices in science, any experiments involving human subjects has to use double blind tests, where neither the subjects nor the researchers that work with the subjects know who belongs in which group.īecause of these, any anecdotal evidence that is based on purely subjective experience is extremely hard, or sometimes is outright impossible to research by using the correct scientific procedures. It is well known that, when scientific experiments are done on human subjects, both knowledge of the subject which group they belong to and the knowledge of the researchers which group any particular subject belongs to may affect the results of the experiment. Let’s have a closer at look various types of anecdotal evidence, so you can make that decision for yourself.Ĭertain topics are impossible to research So, the answer to the question of whether or not one should rely on anecdotal evidence is not that simple. However, it would be next to impossible to validate whether subjective life choices of an individual over his lifetime can reliably yield similar outcomes in another individual. It would be fairly straightforward to conduct a proper scientific research to confirm or deny whether garlic has any slug-repellent properties. There are important distinction between the two examples. However, this wouldn’t necessarily mean that the same steps, if taken by someone else, will produce the same results. When the author says that he was able to use particular steps to get from poverty to riches, he may not be lying. However, until a proper research is done to find out if any substances inside garlic have repellent effect on slugs, these accounts are classed as anecdotal evidence.Īnother type of anecdotal evidence is information you may receive from authors of self-help books. So, essentially, if a person or a group of people have suggested that something works in a particular way, but this phenomenon has never undergone thorough research in accordance with the standards of the modern scientific method, the reports that people have provided is classed as anecdotal evidence.įor example, somebody may notice that planting garlic next to strawberries will prevent slugs from eating the strawberries. In this article, you will find out how anecdotal evidence received its bad reputation and why you shouldn’t always trust those people who say it’s bad.Ĭollins dictionary defines anecdotal evidence as follows:Īnecdotal evidence is based on individual accounts, rather than on reliable research or statistics, and so may not be valid. And there is an important reason for it – those branches of science would cease to exist otherwise. On the other hand, there are areas of science that deem anecdotal evidence perfectly acceptable. For both of those, anecdotal evidence is the only evidence available. And there are those aspects of reality that the mainstream science refuses to research. There are certain aspects of reality that are extremely hard to research scientifically. In fact, even the most hardcore scientists use it regularly for very important life decisions. There are many situations where anecdotal evidence is the best evidence possible. This is what scientists and science teachers repeatedly tell their audience.īut is this statement true? If you have a look at the subject matter closely, it doesn’t appear to be so. Anyone who ever had any interest in science will know that anecdotal evidence is the worst type of evidence possible.