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posted by martyb on Tuesday September 23 2014, @11:11AM   Printer-friendly
from the who-CAN-you-trust? dept.

Phys.org reports:

If scientists want the public to trust their research suggestions, they may want to appear a bit "warmer," according to a new review published by Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs.

The review, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), shows that while Americans view scientists as competent, they are not entirely trusted. This may be because they are not perceived to be friendly or warm.

[...]

Focusing on scientific communication, Fiske and Dupree administered another online survey asking adults to describe public attitudes toward climate scientists specifically to provide a clearer picture of the public's seemingly mixed feelings. The researchers used a seven-scale item of distrust that included motives derived from pilot work on scientists' alleged motives. These included such motives as lying with statistics, complicating a story, showing superiority, gaining research money and pursuing a liberal agenda, among others.

The abstract for the paper can be found here.

Although distrust is low, the apparent motive to gain research money is distrusted. The literature on climate science communicators agrees that the public trusts impartiality, not persuasive agendas. Overall, communicator credibility needs to address both expertise and trustworthiness. Scientists have earned audiences’ respect, but not necessarily their trust. Discussing, teaching, and sharing information can earn trust to show scientists’ trustworthy intentions.

 
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  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by VLM on Tuesday September 23 2014, @11:23AM

    by VLM (445) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday September 23 2014, @11:23AM (#97105)

    "they are not entirely trusted"

    99.9% of americans only have contact with scientists via advertising, where they pull out all the stereotypes, which weirdly enough only live in advertising to begin with, oh and horror movies of course. Then the advertisers have them lie or stretch the truth to sell some garbage.

    As a non religious guy, a good analogy would be my only experience being televangelists getting arrested with kids and prostitutes and weirdo backwards hicks using it as an excuse to hate comparatively more normal people (women, gays, etc), and pandering politicians who obviously don't follow any of the claimed beliefs but do want to kiss up.

    If your only experience is peculiar, going to get some peculiar impressions.

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  • (Score: 2) by DrMag on Tuesday September 23 2014, @04:26PM

    by DrMag (1860) on Tuesday September 23 2014, @04:26PM (#97213)

    which weirdly enough only live in advertising to begin with

    While your point is valid, I'd also point out that this statement isn't entirely true. The one time someone got me to sit down and watch The Big Bang Theory with them I didn't like it; in my years as a Physicist I've known too many people who are just like those characters, minus the trendy popularity.

    They are stereotypes, yes, but stereotypes exist for a reason. It's important not to blanket an entire demographic with a stereotype, but it doesn't mean there don't exist people who fit it.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 23 2014, @04:46PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 23 2014, @04:46PM (#97228)

      The one time someone got me to sit down and watch The Big Bang Theory with them I didn't like it; in my years as a Physicist I've known too many people who are just like those characters, minus the trendy popularity.

      This. The characters on that show portray the fairly rare STEM stereotype - the dork. Occasionally I've had to work with someone like that, and it's not usually enjoyable; thankfully it's only for forty hours a week. Why would I ever want to watch them on TV?

    • (Score: 2) by frojack on Tuesday September 23 2014, @07:44PM

      by frojack (1554) on Tuesday September 23 2014, @07:44PM (#97317) Journal

      Pretty much true, I've known scientist (and mathematicians) types that match up with one or more of those characters pretty closely.

      But the main part of VLMs rant was pretty close. The US has very little contact with scientists. (Its not that different anywhere in the world either. Unless you happen to live in a large university town, you don't really don't run into these people. They just don't spend any time on TV talk show circuits in any country. Still it makes a good basis for another in the never ending stream of VLM's hate on america rants).

      Some of the Actual rocket scientists we saw routinely during the effort to get to the moon were probably some of the best exposure routinely found in american media.

      Carl Sagen, Steve Squyres got a lot of air time in the last 20 years. As did some of the nuclear scientists on occasion.

      Still I don't see this as a big deal. We don't routinely see members of any specific occupation on TV other than politicians and cops and doctors. We'd be bored to tears if we did.

      --
      No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.