Evidence literacy guides

Learn how to read health headlines

Plain-English guides to help you understand study types, evidence strength and when a claim goes too far.

Start here

The best first guide if you are new to checking health and science claims.

Start here

A practical checklist for spotting overstatement, weak evidence and missing caveats in any health article.

Headline checklist First read Plain English

Short guides for the patterns that most often make headlines sound stronger than the science.

Study types

Why promising results in animals do not prove that a treatment works or is safe in people.

Animal evidence Translation gap Human benefit

Common trap

Why a study can find a link between two things without proving cause and effect.

Association Confounding Causation

Outcomes

Why a lab marker does not always mean someone feels better, functions better or avoids disease.

Biomarkers Patient outcomes Real-world benefit

How to interpret the grades, verdicts and caveats inside deHype evidence reports.

Evidence grades

How deHype weighs evidence strength, human relevance and claim overstatement.

Grades Verdicts Caveats