Facilitated Communication used at Amsterdam University College

[tusenfem]

Oh Dear!

At the Amsterdam University College they let a girl "study" using Facilitated Communication!
here link to Dutch newspaper
here link to Dutch skeptics journal "Skepter"
Sorry I could not find any English links.

So, first she did math at highschool, but she thought it was too difficult.
Then she got a new "facilitator" and suddendly was very good at it.

Now, needless to say that "facilitated communication" only works when the "facilitator" also can look at the sheet with letters whilst holding the hand of the person being facilitated. This was described in the Skeptical Inquirer.

From the website of the Amsterdam University College: ... we strongly believe that the natural sciences, health and life sciences, and information sciences play a pivotal role in the solution of highly complex problems in our global society.

This is supposed to be the "excellence centre" of the two Amsterdam universities.

[Andromeda321]

If you punch those URLs into Google Translate, a pretty good English translation pops up.

Well if it's worth anything I have friends here in the UvAmsterdam astro dept who have had to TA there, and despite the Amsterdam University College hype there are an awful lot of students there who are not very intelligent based on their stories! A bad push at humor perhaps, but yeah, I mainly always feel bad for the girl who's "communicating" in stories like this. Surely there is actual therapy that she could be getting during all those hours of coursework.

[primummobile]

Oh Dear!

At the Amsterdam University College they let a girl "study" using Facilitated Communication!
here link to Dutch newspaper
here link to Dutch skeptics journal "Skepter"
Sorry I could not find any English links.

So, first she did math at highschool, but she thought it was too difficult.
Then she got a new "facilitator" and suddendly was very good at it.

Now, needless to say that "facilitated communication" only works when the "facilitator" also can look at the sheet with letters whilst holding the hand of the person being facilitated. This was described in the Skeptical Inquirer.

From the website of the Amsterdam University College: ... we strongly believe that the natural sciences, health and life sciences, and information sciences play a pivotal role in the solution of highly complex problems in our global society.

This is supposed to be the "excellence centre" of the two Amsterdam universities.

I know they probably wouldn't ever admit to it, but do you think that the facilitators intentionally do this, or are they victims of the same wishful thinking?

[tusenfem]

I think the conclusion in the Skeptical Inquirer was that the facilitators actually believe in what they are doing.
They came up with some reasons why it did not work when they could not see the sheet with letters.

[primummobile]

OK. I read the first two articles, but somehow I missed the third link to the Skeptical Inquirer report. It was an interesting read. Thanks. I think it's sad that some mental health professionals are more worried about saving face than whether or not they are giving people hope for something that could never happen.