Researchers survey why some individuals hold strong mindsets to science whilst others are more neutral.
Study of over 2,000 grownups in the UK identifies possible mistakes of science communication.
Do individuals who believe they understand science in fact know science? In general, the research study exposed that people with strong negative attitudes to science tend to be overconfident about their level of understanding.
Whether it be vaccines, environment change, or GM foods, societally crucial science can evoke opposing and strong mindsets. Understanding how to communicate science requires an understanding of why people might hold such exceptionally different attitudes to the exact same underlying science. The brand-new study performed a study of over 2,000 UK adults, asking them both about their mindsets to science and their belief in their own understanding. A couple of prior analyses discovered that individuals that are negative towards science tend to have fairly low textbook understanding but strong self-belief in their understanding. With this insight as foundational, the team looked for to ask whether strong self-belief underpinned all strong mindsets.
People could state how much they disagreed or agreed with such a statement. All individuals were scored from absolutely no (they know they have no understanding) to one (they are positive they comprehend).
Why do people hold extremely variable mindsets towards well-evidenced science? Do people who believe they know science in fact understand science? A new study published on January 24th in the open gain access to journal PLOS Biology by Cristina Fonseca of the Genetics Society, UK; Laurence Hurst of the Milner Centre for Evolution, University of Bath, UK; and associates, finds that individuals with strong mindsets tend to believe they comprehend science, while neutrals are less positive. Overall, the study exposed that people with strong negative mindsets to science tend to be overconfident about their level of understanding.
Understanding how to communicate science requires an understanding of why people may hold such exceptionally various attitudes to the very same underlying science.
Emotionally, the team recommend, this makes sense: to hold a strong opinion you need to strongly believe in the accuracy of your understanding of the standard truths. The present team could reproduce the previous outcomes discovering that those most negative tend also not to have high book knowledge. By contrast, those more accepting of science both think they understand it and scored well on the book fact (true/false) concerns.
Science interaction focused on passing info from scientists to the public when it was thought that what mattered most for scientific literacy was clinical understanding. This method might not be successful, and in some cases can backfire. The present work suggests that working to address the discrepancies in between what individuals understand and what they believe they understand may be a much better method.
Professor Anne Ferguson-Smith, President of the Genetics Society and co-author of the research study comments, “Confronting negative mindsets towards science held by some people will likely include deconstructing what they believe they understand about science and replacing it with more accurate understanding. This is rather difficult.”
Hurst concludes, “Why do some individuals hold strong attitudes to science whilst others are more neutral? We discover that strong attitudes, both for and versus, are underpinned by strong self-esteem in knowledge about science.”
Reference: “People with more severe mindsets towards science have confidence in their understanding of science, even if this is not justified” by Cristina Fonseca, Jonathan Pettitt, Alison Woollard, Adam Rutherford, Wendy Bickmore, Anne Ferguson-Smith and Laurence D. Hurst, 24 January 2023, PLOS Biology.DOI: 10.1371/ journal.pbio.3001915.
The work was allowed by funding from The Genetics Society to the Chair of their Public Engagement committee (AW). No grant number specified. The funders had no role in research study style, data collection and analysis, decision to release, or preparation of the manuscript.