Citizen attitudes toward science and technology, 1957–2020: measurement, stability, and the Trump challenge

  1. Miller, Jon D 4
  2. Laspra, Belén 1
  3. Polino, Carmelo 1
  4. Branch, Glenn 3
  5. Ackerman, Mark S 5
  6. Pennock, Robert T 2
  1. 1 Department of Philosophy, University of Oviedo, Campus de Humanidades , C/Amparo Pedregal, Oviedo s/n 33011, Spain
  2. 2 Lyman Briggs College, Michigan State University , East Lansing, MI 48825, United States
  3. 3 National Center for Science Education , 230 Grand Avenue, Suite 101, Oakland, CA 94610, United States
  4. 4 International Center for the Advancement of Scientific Literacy, Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan , 426 Thompson Street, Ann Arbor, MI 48106, United States
  5. 5 College of Engineering and School of Information, University of Michigan , Ann Arbor, MI 48106, United States
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Revista:
Science and Public Policy

ISSN: 0302-3427,  1471-5430

Ano de publicación: 2024

Tipo: Artigo

DOI: 10.1093/SCIPOL/SCAD086 GOOGLE SCHOLAR lock_openAcceso aberto editor

Outras publicacións en: Science and Public Policy

Obxectivos de Desenvolvemento Sustentable

Resumo

In democratic societies around the world, the number of science policy decisions is increasing. One of the fundamental principles of democracy is that citizens should be able to understand the issues before them. Using a 63-year cross-sectional US data set, we use confirmatory factor analysis to construct and test a two-dimensional measure of attitude to science and technology that has been relatively stable over the last six decades. Previous and current research tells us that only one in three US adults is scientifically literate, meaning that trust in scientific expertise is important to many citizens. We find that trust in scientific expertise polarized during the Trump administration. Using the same data set, we construct two structural equation models to determine the factors that predict positive attitudes toward science and technology. Comparing 2016 and 2020, we find that the Trump attacks on science did not reduce public support for science.

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