
Habits of cell phone usage and sperm quality - pwm
http://www.rbmojournal.com/article/S1472-6483(15)00300-4/abstract
======
tomp
Hm... judging by the cover, this looks like absolute crap.

> Some studies have shown a continuous decline in semen quality since the
> beginning of the 20th century.

Studies also indicate a continuous decline in testosterone (in males) over
20th century. I'd welcome someone correct my biological knowledge, but I would
guess that testosterone influences production of sperm, not the other way
round. So they're probably studying the wrong thing.

> One postulated contributing factor is radio frequency electromagnetic
> radiation emitted from _cell phones_.

So... how do you then explain the decline from 1900 until 1990?!?

> Questionnaires accessing demographic data and characteristics of cell phone
> usage were completed by 106 men

Trying to do statistics on a small, ...

> referred for semen analysis

... biased sample, seriously?!

I'm too paranoidly afraid of the negative effects of radiation, but even I'm
inclined to call bullshit on this study.

~~~
Mikeb85
> Studies also indicate a continuous decline in testosterone (in males) over
> 20th century. I'd welcome someone correct my biological knowledge, but I
> would guess that testosterone influences production of sperm, not the other
> way round. So they're probably studying the wrong thing.

Yup. And our society also happens to encourage activities which lower
testosterone levels (various things like inactivity, weight gain, poor sleep
and stress all sap testosterone levels).

~~~
trhway
>And our society also happens to encourage activities which lower testosterone
levels

also important that natural selection in our society isn't for higher
testosterone anymore. Peaceful interaction and coexistence lead to more
success than open aggression ("success" here is in natural selection sense,
i.e. producing next generation and bringing them into "successful" (in the
same sense) adulthood)

------
yummyfajitas
I can't critique the article directly, since it's behind a paywall.

But I can take the purported results and do some Bayesian analysis with it.
Take first a prior - due to my knowledge of physics, my prior on
microwave/RF/visual radiation having any biological effect is 10^{-5}.
Multiphoton ionization has simply never been observed to happen except under
extremely intense (read: it'll melt you) fields and there are strong
theoretical reasons to believe it won't happen.

I.e., if this effect is real, it'll require new physics to explain. Most
likely 10^{-5} is a conservative prior on the likelihood that an experimental
paper overturns quantum mechanics.

Now, lets take their strongest result (p = 0.02) and do a Bayes update with
it, assuming a complete absense of selection bias/etc (i.e. imagining this was
a perfect RCT).

P(effect false | experiment result) = P(experiment result | effect false)
P(effect false) / P(experiment result)

= 0.02 x (1-10^{-5}) / P(experiment result)

We can compute the latter as P(experiment result | effect false) x (1 -
10^{-5}) + P(experiment result | effect real) x 10^{-5} \approx 0.02 x 1.0.
Assuming optimistically that the statistical power - aka P(experiment result |
effect real) - is 0.99, the bottom is 0.020009700000000002.

Plugging and chugging yields:

P(effect false | experiment result) = 0.9995052399586201

Or equivalently P(effect real | experiment result) = 0.000494760041379938.

As a result, assuming you believe strongly in quantum physics (I do), this
experiment provides wildly insufficient data to overturn QM and believe the
effect is real.

Note: I'm not explaining here why quantum mechanics says multiphoton
ionization is a tiny effect, negligible in biological applications, I'm just
going to argue by authority:
[https://www.chrisstucchio.com/publications.html](https://www.chrisstucchio.com/publications.html)

~~~
dekhn
Like many people, you're starting from assumption of the mechanism
(ionization) and ignoring the fact that there are many other known physical
mechanisms that are plausible.

Also, if people detect a reliable signal without a plausible physical
mechanism, best thing to do is determine what the cause of the signal is-
rather than just assuming it's impossible.

In grad school we were taught to do "back of the envelope" calculations to
rule out improbably hypotheses, but I often found the physics people convinced
(I think they used the term "proved impossible") themselves things wouldn't
work, then after 5-7 years of grad school, managed to come up with actual
physical data that showed they had made a false assumption.

~~~
yummyfajitas
What are the other plausible mechanisms? The effect of low intensity RF fields
on chemistry is essentially negligible. For the most part, folks doing
chemistry with non-ionizing radiation need intense lasers or microwave
resonating cavities.

The main exceptions (which in reality also mostly require intense radiation)
are highly engineered scenarios where you finely tune a radiation source to
excite an electron to a specific level that's far from the continuous
spectrum, but useful for some other chemical to interact with. To detect low
frequency radiation, these usually require very specific materials with nearly
continuous energy bands (think carefully doped semiconductors or possibly
photoreceptor proteins).

These are also highly unlikely to occur - again, unless you've engineered it
to happen, 10^{-5} is probably an extreme overestimate on the probability.

But if you know a plausible mechanism, I'd love to hear it. Feel free to
provide references or go into physical detail.

~~~
dekhn
Again, you're making a ton of assumptions about mechanisms. Saying low
intensity RF has a negligible effect on chemistry belies the fact that cell
receptors can be exquisitely sensitive and those receptors can cause large
changes in cells via DNA transcription.

The current most plausible mechanism is localized cell heating. We already
know that RF can cause cell heating. There are a number of physical responses
to cell heating
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heat_shock_protein](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heat_shock_protein))
which can have large effects on cell morphology.

I am not claiming that _is_ the mechanism. But I've seen enough epidemilogical
studies that have been conducted carefully enough to suggest there is _some_
mechanism by which negative health effects may be occurring, and I think that
alone makes it worth being a bit more creative than trying to disprove the
observed evidence by claiming one of the plausible mechanisms isn't.

(I have a PhD in Biophysics; I've worked up and down the molecular stack, and
if there's one thing I've learned, it's that if the epidemiologists carry out
a good study, and the meta-analysts confirm the effect, it's always a good
idea to be open minded about the cause).

~~~
yummyfajitas
Of course I'm making assumptions - the biggest one is that quantum chemistry
works.

If you are now retreating to thermal effects, they a) can be easily measured
and b) are vastly smaller than effects like wearing tighty whities or walking
past a radiator in winter. Is your sole claim that using a cell phone might
have an effect 1/100th as large as blow drying one's balls after a shower?

Let me reason by analogy, to explain the probabilitistic intuition here.
Study: we threw golf balls at aircraft carriers and cargo vessels, and
concluded that they are an effective naval weapon. The probability of
observing this result by random chance, assuming golf balls don't sink
aircraft carriers, is 2%.

Would you draw the conclusion that golf balls are likely to sink aircraft
carriers from such a study?

~~~
dekhn
No, my sole claim is not that using a cell phone would have 1/100th the effect
of blow drying ones testicles after a shower (why????)

After all, the phone stays around a lot longer (temporal effect) and I have
certainly noticed that when the phone is using lots of bandwidth it stays warm
for hours at a time. Many effects in biology can occur from extended exposure
(cumulative dosage effects) when they don't have an effect from acute
exposure. And vice versa, of course.

Anyway, reasoning from probabilistic intuition here is probably a mistake: the
epi studies show stuff that doesn't agree with our intuition (this is common)
and that leads theorists and experimentalists to go search for other causes.
In the history of science, we have a long list of things that weren't
intuitive but ultimately were figured out.

Finally falling back on "I assume QC works" isn't really informative in this
case. I assume QC works to and I don't see why that negates the possibility
that cell phones can have negative health effects caused by physical
mechanisms.

~~~
yummyfajitas
QM rules out non-thermal effects. Once you retreat to thermal effects you have
conceded that a cell phone is vastly less dangerous than turning the
thermostat from 74 to 75 (if you want to think about extended exposure) or
blow drying one's balls (if you want to think about acute exposure). Now those
things probably do have some measurable effect - certainly temperature effects
sperm count, which is why men are advised not to wear tighty whities.

Computing the size of cell phone effects, relative to things like moving from
NY to slightly warmer DC is just a simple thermodynamic calculation. If the
study is concerned about such tiny relative risks, they are both a) wildly
underpowered to detect them and b) certainly aren't making that clear in the
abstract.

Now, it's possible that our physics-based priors are wildly wrong. But as the
calculation I did notes, this study is too underpowered to significantly
change our views on that.

~~~
Retric
Outside temperature is less important than you might assume we can lower or
pull back our boys to regulate temperature. Airflow and being physically
pushed back into the body is a major factor so your boys can overheat when
it's 55 or be fine when it's 95.

------
cyphar
I don't even need to read the actual paper in order to debunk it. They admit a
selection bias in their fucking abstract: "Questionnaires accessing
demographic data and characteristics of cell phone usage were completed by 106
men __referred for semen analysis __. "

------
cozzyd
I think you can pretty much reproduce their study from the percentages with
the following table (they claim 26 of the 106 did not meet study eligibility
criteria, but the total seems to be 79? but then the total isn't consistent
between the two categories; I didn't read carefully enough to see if the
discrepancy is explained)

    
    
       categories    abnormal semen (n=34)   normal semen (n=45)
        talk >1h          14                   9
            <=1h          20                   36
         
        while 
        chging? 
             yes          12                   6
             no           21                   38
    
              
    

It's interesting to note that they actually collected more data than < 1h and
>1h (they more finely categorized it as 0-30, 30-60, 60-120 and 120+). The
freedom to choose the boundary there should count against the p-value.

Of course, it would be nice if they treated hours talking on phone as a
continuous variable instead of a discrete <1h and >1h. With the freedom to set
that boundary (if they had that), it would reduce the associated p-value.

Either way, it's very unlikely that the cause is RF radiation and not some
confounding variable. Radiation damage is pretty much excluded, and I don't
think there can be any effect on the impulses of the nervous system, which I
think operates in the kHz, very far away from the 800 MHz+ from cell phones.

Talking while charging seems very unlikely to be related to any radiation, but
might be associated with talking while driving or a sedentary lifestyle or
something like that.

~~~
scott_s
I also noticed that discrepancy in the "talking while charging column"; 21 +
12 = 33 != 34. I briefly looked for an explanation in the text, but I could
not find one.

------
ngold5
Would need to see the full article to find out the size of their sample, but
their confidence intervals are quite tight for a study of this nature, and
they add in the caveat of further research being needed. This should be a
least a warning correlation for cell phone users, and will make me rethink
some of my usage habits.

~~~
wwkeyboard
Or the 5th sentence of the abstract:

> Questionnaires accessing demographic data and characteristics of cell phone
> usage were completed by 106 men referred for semen analysis

And this article isn't recommending a change in behavior, only further study:

> Investigation using large-scale studies is thus needed.

~~~
evils
"Investigation using large-scale studies is thus needed."

Which would be the conclusion of pretty much any result that they could have
had. I could have given you that recommendation even without conducting a
study at all.

------
nxzero
Not an expert on critical analysis of research, but seems like there's a bit
of selection bias given the population studied wanted to reproduce and was
referred to the study based on being unable to do so.

~~~
maxerickson
There could be an over-represented subgroup of the general population who are
more susceptible to the cell phone radiation, but selecting from that group
would not necessarily obscure the relationship between the amount of cell
phone use and any resulting biological impact.

They don't go very far out on the limb, they say that it probably justifies a
bigger study, which is pretty mild.

~~~
cyphar
> There could be an over-represented subgroup of the general population who
> are more susceptible to the cell phone radiation, but selecting from that
> group would not necessarily obscure the relationship between the amount of
> cell phone use and any resulting biological impact.

That's not what he said. If you read the abstract, it says that the candidates
were chosen using "questionnaires accessing demographic data and
characteristics of cell phone usage were completed by 106 men __referred for
semen analysis __. " The fact that they were referred for semen analysis
(read: they were having trouble reproducing) indicates there'd be a selection
bias in their study. And without a control group, it's all hand-waving anyway.

> They don't go very far out on the limb, they say that it probably justifies
> a bigger study, which is pretty mild.

In order to do it properly, they'd need a much bigger study and a much better
sample.

~~~
maxerickson
My point was that the selection bias proposed will not necessarily obscure a
biological effect (or at least, correlation).

Setting aside the legitimacy of pursuing this research, looking for effects
using statistical analyses of medical records is an interesting way to direct
at least a small amount of research, saying that such questions can only be
asked when there is solid control of every factor is probably not a win.

~~~
cyphar
> My point was that the selection bias proposed will not necessarily obscure a
> biological effect (or at least, correlation).

I'd argue that the sample was not representative of the general population, so
"it will not necessarily obscure" isn't relevant IMO because the results
aren't even remotely close to being applicable to any other group of men.

> looking for effects using statistical analyses of medical records is an
> interesting way to direct at least a small amount of research

I agree that it's interesting. And since I can't read the paper at the moment
(I'll download a copy through my university when I get a chance) I can't
really comment on the statistical methods they used (I'm not even sure what
they asked on the questionnaire). Statistical analysis is _only_ useful if you
take into account all of the parameter space (or at least all of the
significant parameter space) otherwise you'll get a biased result.

Even then, correlation does not imply causation, so a statistical analysis
would only be useful as a survey of "what could be investigated to do actual
science on". People put far too much faith into statistics, and it

> saying that such questions can only be asked when there is solid control of
> every factor is probably not a win

Anyone can ask a question. I'm saying that the paper published should've
actually been an email (or maybe just an article) sent around a faculty so
they could do real research on the topic. "Asking a question" and "publishing
a paper on a topic" are very different classes of activities.

------
evils
If I interpret the abstract correctly, the change in sperm they observed was
only correlated to talking on a cell phone whilst charging it (that is,
holding it next to your head), where keeping it right next to the groin did
not show any significant influence?

That doesn't sound like a plausible outcome of radiation having any influence.

------
drostie
Please note that they were _not_ able to prove that having your cell phone
near your groin correlated with abnormal sperm. Rather, they found a
correlation with being _very chatty_ and being _chatty while charging_.

Correlations, of course, are also not causation. For example, there is no
control in this study which rules out an effect like "some men have less
testosterone, and this causes them to both be more glued to their phones
(using while charging), more social on their phones (talking for over an hour
a day), and to have a higher incidence of abnormal sperm." It's sort of like a
headline: "If you're shorter, you may be a better parent: a study found an
inverse correlation between height and how much time you spend with your
kids." You'd be tempted to disbelieve me until I tell you that on average,
women are shorter and also spend more time with their kids. If in this case we
know the causes, how much more difficult is it when we don't to isolate the
confounding variables?

------
blakesterz
>> a non-significantly higher rate of abnormal sperm concentration was found
(47.1% versus 11.1%).

As someone contemplating a vasectomy, that's not quite the result I was hoping
for. Sure would be easier to just keep my phone in my front pocket. Though, I
suppose I'm not really sure what "abnormal" sperm end up doing. It's kind of
implied that means they just don't work when the abstract starts out "Male
infertility constitutes 30–40% of all infertility cases." but what if those
sperm cause birth defects instead? Seems like that's a far from ideal result
as well. As always... "Investigation using large-scale studies is thus
needed."

~~~
facepalm
Maybe somebody could create an app for that, somehow optimize the radiation
for killing sperms...

~~~
UnoriginalGuy
There is research on ultrasound devices which do what you're asking. Designed
to work as short-medium term contraceptives[0]. That isn't how smartphones
kill sperm however, just as an aside for getting the same-ish results.

[0] [http://www.cbsnews.com/news/scientists-zap-sperm-counts-
with...](http://www.cbsnews.com/news/scientists-zap-sperm-counts-with-
ultrasound-next-male-birth-control/)

~~~
nickpsecurity
Thanks for that link. Interesting. There's also the evidence... which needs
more corroboration to be sure... that heat above a certain temperature kills
them or weakens them. Small scale experiments and survey of blast-furnace
workers provided evidence for it. With both, the fertility went back to normal
I think a few months after they left the environment where they were
overheated.

So, initial evidence for sperm-killing heat to be a safe and effective
contraceptive. Doesn't feel as bad as you'd think, either.

------
sokoloff
From the abstract: _Some studies have shown a continuous decline in semen
quality since the beginning of the 20th century. One postulated contributing
factor is radio frequency electromagnetic radiation emitted from cell phones._

If the decline is since the start of the 20th century (1901), cell phones are
unlikely to be a primary cause. The first cell phone was in 1973 and they
didn't become commonplace until the end of the 20th or start of the 21st
century. Unclear if the premise is wrongly stated or if the authors are
confusing the 20th and 21st century.

------
analog31
I don't know the inner details of cell phone technology, but as I understand
it, the phone throttles its radio output power based on the quality of the
signal, to conserve battery. Thus, usage in hours isn't exactly a measure of
RF dose.

------
Gnarl
[http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.3109/15368378.2015.104...](http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.3109/15368378.2015.1043557)

------
z3t4
Don't play with your phone instead of your partner or penis.

------
zyxzevn
The problem is that we have a bad model to describe the effect of EM-waves on
biological tissue. Currently the model defines biological bodies as containers
of water. This is clearly wrong.

What I propose is standard antenna science. Something needs to resonate with
the biological systems. In artificial antennas there are free electrons. In
biological bodies there are ions and polar molecules. Most proteins are
diamagnetic, except when they are in reaction. These are the things that we
need to concentrate on.

There are also new discoveries that show that biology uses quantum super
position states in some of the important proteins. This allows these proteins
to be far more sensitive to electromagnetism. For example: the magnetic sense
of birds depend on it. Another example is chlorophyll, which becomes more
sensitive to light (which is an EM-wave) than usual. Other discoveries show
that DNA might be a conductor. And in combination with EM-radiation the
functioning of parts of the DNA can be reduced or enhanced. This is new
science which clearly shows that we were wrong about the effect of
electromagnetism and biology before.

Also interesting are processes in biology that have certain frequencies of
themselves like the firing of neurons. And other repetitive processes like the
transcoding of DNA to RNA and of RNA to proteins.

Note that all these antenna possibilities depend on certain frequencies. On
some frequencies we might see no result at all, while on others it affects a
certain process in a negative or even positive way. And looking a the actual
research at [http://www.microwavenews.com](http://www.microwavenews.com) this
seems to be the case. A lot of research show some kind of effect (negative and
positive), while others don't.

Sadly many scientists do not know much about both biology and antennas. They
usually talk about ionization and heat, which are not the problem at all. It
is actually very stupid to see that as the problem.

I do not think that EM-radiation is totally bad. It is just something that is
damaging on the long term due to stress and disturbance of the biological
processes and systems (when they resonate with the specific frequencies of the
signals).

~~~
zyxzevn
Scientific evidence proving my point:
[http://www.utdallas.edu/news/2016/2/3-31891_Study-
Uncovers-H...](http://www.utdallas.edu/news/2016/2/3-31891_Study-Uncovers-How-
Electromagnetic-Fields-Amplify-_story-
wide.html?WT.mc_id=NewsHomePageCenterColumn)

------
codeshaman
Good! There's too many of us already.

6.8 billion phones today means 6.8 billion pieces of high tech garbage a
couple of years later, leaking all kinds of toxic shit into the water, plus
6.8 billion new devices manufactured while digging up all kinds of precious
materials out of the ground and using oil to transport them all over the
world, then burning coal, heating oil and natural gas to melt and glue shit
together, and then burn more oil to transport the finished devices to
customers all over the world.

That helps climate change, which leads to droughts in places like Brazil,
determining people to use bathtubs to catch every drop of rain, were mosquitos
breed and then fly around spreading Zika.

More phones and more porn, that's what's needed for a happy future.

/sarcasm

~~~
hellbanner
It really is disgusting how temporary cellphones are built. Where are the
modular personal computers?

~~~
mohn
Europe [1]. I was very interested when I first saw some Fairphone 2 buzz
online a couple months ago, but I'm a little apprehensive about water
resistance and the price (525 EUR). Also, most people probably wouldn't have
this problem, but I'd have to switch to a different cell provider to use an
FP2.

[1] [https://www.fairphone.com/phone/](https://www.fairphone.com/phone/)

------
strebler
Other studies show significantly decreased mobility and sperm quality as well
(some in-vitro with microscope).

Anecdotally, I'm quite confident this was a factor with our 2nd child. With
our 1st, I didn't own a cell phone and he was conceived literally the first
try.

I bought a smart phone when he was 1, which I carried in my pocket. A few
years later, we wanted another child - tried for 10 months with no results!
Frustrating. I randomly found some studies covering this exact subject in mid
July. I started putting my phone into my backpack. August, our 2nd was on his
way.

For anyone who's having troubles, I would strongly advise to take the phone
out of your pocket. It might even be best for everyone to do so - who knows
the long term effects.

~~~
evils
Fertility decreases with age, especially in women. That your second child took
longer to conceive than the first is no evidence of anything and even less of
the influence of cell phone ownership. You might just as well claim that
having your first child decreased your fertility, or anything else that
happened to you in between. (Bought a new car? A new TV? Different brand
toothpaste?)

~~~
pc86
Crest is notorious for decreasing sperm motility. /s

