Tag Archives: Kathleen Hall Jamieson

Do you believe in science?

As for believing in science

A September 26, 2019 Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania news release (received via email) announces some research into science, communication, belief, and trust,

Public confidence in science has remained high and stable for years. But recent decades have seen incidents of scientific fraud and misconduct, failure to replicate key findings, and growth in the number of retractions – all of which may affect trust in science.
In an article published this week in PNAS, a group of leaders in science research, scholarship, and communication propose that to sustain a high level of trust in science, scientists must more effectively signal to each other and to the public that their work respects the norms of science.
The authors offer a variety of ways in which researchers and journals can communicate this – among them, greater transparency regarding data and methods; ways to certify the integrity of evidence; the disclosure of competing or relevant interests by authors; and wider adoption of tools such as checklists and badges to signal that studies have met accepted scientific standards.
“This absence [of clear signals] is problematic,” write the researchers, including Kathleen Hall Jamieson, professor of communication at the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania and director of its Annenberg Public Policy Center (APPC). “Without clear signals, other scientists have difficulties ascertaining confidence in the work, and the press, policy makers, and the public at large may base trust decisions on inappropriate grounds, such as deeply held and irrational biases, nonscientific beliefs, and misdirection by conflicted stakeholders or malicious actors.”
In addition to Jamieson, “Signaling the trustworthiness of science,” published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, was written by Marcia McNutt, president of the National Academy of Sciences; Veronique Kiermer, executive editor, Public Library of Science (PLOS); and Richard Sever, assistant director, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, and co-founder, bioRxiv. The order of authorship was determined by a coin toss.
…
The American public and trust in science
The authors write that “science is trustworthy in part because it honors its norms.” These norms include a reliance on statistics; having conclusions that are supported by data; disinterestedness, as seen through the disclosure of potential competing interests; validation by peer review; and ethical treatment of research subjects and animals.
Adherence to these norms increases not just the reliability of the scientific findings, but the likelihood that the public will perceive science itself as reliable. The article cites a 2019 survey of 1,253 U.S. adults conducted by APPC, which found that in deciding whether to believe a scientific finding, 68% of those surveyed said it matters whether the scientists make their data and methods available and are completely transparent about their methods. In addition, 63% said it matters whether the scientists involved in the study disclose the individuals and organizations that funded their work, and 55% said it mattered whether the study has been published in a peer-reviewed journal (Fig. 1). For further details, see the article.
Communicating norms
To support trust in science, the authors suggest that scientists need to communicate practices that reinforce the norms, among them:
Have scientists explain the evidence and process by which they came to reconsider and change their views on a scientific issue;
Have journals add links back and forward to retractions and expressions of editorial concern to more clearly indicate unreliability, and to studies that replicate findings to emphasize reliability;
Adopt nuanced signaling language that more clearly explains the process now often called “retraction,” using terms such as “voluntary withdrawal” and “withdrawal for cause” or “editorial withdrawal.” Similarly, replace “conflict of interest” with a more neutral, broadened term such as “relevant interest.”
The authors also call for steps to show that individual studies adhere to these norms, such as:
A more refined and standardized series of checklists should be used by journals to show how they protect evidence-gathering and -reporting, including more detailed information about each author’s contributions to a manuscript;
Badges such as those used by the Center for Open Science should be more widely adopted to show, for instance, whether scientists on a study have preregistered their hypothesis and met standards for open data and open materials.
.....
The recommendations were developed following an April 2018 conference called “Signals of Trust in Science Communication” which was convened by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory at the Banbury Center and organized by McNutt, Sever, and Jamieson.
“Science enjoys a relatively high level of public trust,” the authors write. “To sustain this valued commodity, in our increasingly polarized age, scientists and the custodians of science would do well to signal to other researchers and to the public and policy makers the ways in which they are safeguarding science’s norms and improving the practices that protect its integrity as a way of knowing.
“Embedding signals of trust in the reporting of individual studies can help researchers build their peers’ confidence in their work,” they continue. “Publishing platforms that rigorously apply these signals of trust can increase their standing as trustworthy vehicles. But beyond this peer-to-peer communication, the research community and its institutions also can signal to the public and policy makers that the scientific community itself actively protects the trustworthiness of its work.”

Comments about confidence and trust

I like the recommendations about more openness and clarity in science communication.

Here are my caveats. (1) This research and the recommendations seem more oriented to the science community and very serious science hobbyists. Most people (regardless of that survey, which I’d like to look at) outside the range I’ve described are unlikely to hear of these changes let alone express any interest or appreciation. (2) It’s also a little difficult to identify which sciences are included. E.g., what about the social sciences? (3) I don’t like this recommendation: ” replace ‘conflict of interest’ with a more neutral, broadened term such as ‘relevant interest’.” An author who is being funded by a pharmaceutical company doesn’t have just a ‘relevant interest’.

Interestingly, there’s a May 24, 2019 paper (link and citation to follow), ‘Health Misinformation and the Power of Narrative Messaging in the Public Sphere‘ covering some of the same ground about science, trust, and communication but with a primary focus on misinformation, health, narrative, and social media. The folks being considered here are the ‘general public’ not the specialized audiences envisioned by the authors of the first paer,

… The power of social media and the impact of narrative are prevalent and strong, so there is an imperative to strategically draw on their advantages to counter some of their more problematic applications. For example, research has shown that narratives presenting the ramifications of not vaccinating – specifically children’s suffering from preventable illness – can have a real impact on intention to vaccinate [Shelby and Ernst, 2013; Capurro, Greenberg, Dubé and Driedger, 2018]. Additionally, clear and definitive statements with a narrative component, made by respected and trusted voices will prove highly useful, and also provide dependable resources upon which journalists can rely.
Opinion editorials offer another useful pathway for narrative communication – indeed, recent research has found them to have an influence on public perception [Coppock, Ekins, and Kirby, 2018]. That said, science writing could also benefit from narrative style, if applied in a manner that does not compromise the truthfulness and comprehensiveness of the content [Perrault, 2013]. We shouldn’t use narratives to fight anecdote with anecdote. Rather, narratives can serve as a vehicle to communicate science and relevant science-informed policy in a more engaging and digestible manner. The spread of misinformation causes real harm. Unfortunately, countering this noise is growing increasingly more complex and challenging. It will require the use of a host of science communication tools and strategies, including the creative use of narratives.

This paper appears to be a roundup of documents supporting the authors’ perspectives with no critique of their own ideas/perspectives offered. The journal has placed the paper is a section known as ‘Critical Commentaries’.

The approaches offered by the authors of these two papers are compatible with each other. As in all aspects of communication, much depends on your audience. And, a member of an expert audience can be a member of the general public in an area where (s)he has no particular expertise.

The papers

Here’s a link to and a citation for the first paper mentioned here,

Signaling the trustworthiness of science by Kathleen Hall Jamieson, Marcia McNutt, Veronique Kiermer, and Richard Sever. PNAS September 24, 2019 116 (39) 19231-19236; First published online: September 23, 2019 https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1913039116

Here’s a link and a citation for the second paper mentioned here,

Health Misinformation and the Power of Narrative Messaging in the Public Sphere by Timothy Caulfield, Alessandro R. Marcon, Blake Murdoch, Jasmine M. Brown, Sarah Tinker Perrault, Jonathan Jerry, Jeremy Snyder, Samantha J. Anthony, Stephanie Brooks, Zubin Master, Ubaka Ogbogu, Joshua Greenberg, Amy Zarzeczny, Robyn Hyde-Lay. Canadian Journal of Bioethics, Vol 2 No 2 (2019): Open Issue Published May 24, 2019 DOI: https://doi.org/10.7202/1060911ar

The first article appears to be open access while the second is definitely open access.

Believe

Quite the performance, eh? Adam Lambert turned the song into a ballad and even brought Cher to tears. I wonder what it would be like to hear it with the lyric changed to, ‘Do you believe in science?’

Can a true believer switch sides on the GM (specifically, genetically modified foods) debate and influence others?

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They’re usually called apostates; those people who switch from one belief to its opposite. In this case, an advocate who opposed genetically modified foods switched sides as a January 17, 2019 news item on ScienceDaily explains,

What happens when a strong advocate for one side of a controversial issue in science publicly announces that he or she now believes the opposite? Does the message affect the views of those who witness it — and if so, how?
Although past research suggests that such “conversion messages” may be an effective persuasion technique, the actual effect of such messages has been unknown.

A January 17, 2019 Annenberg Public Policy Center (University of Pennsylvania, US) news release (also on EurekAlert), which originated the news item, notes that the ‘conversion’ can have an effect in certain circumstances,

Now, a new study from researchers at the Annenberg Public Policy Center shows that such a conversion message can influence public attitudes toward genetically modified (GM) foods.
Using video of a talk by the British environmentalist Mark Lynas about his transformation from an opponent of GM crops to an advocate, researchers found that Lynas’ conversion narrative had a greater impact on the attitudes of people who viewed it than a direct advocacy message.
“People exposed to the conversion message rather than a simple pro-GM message had a more favorable attitude toward GM foods,” said Benjamin A. Lyons, a former postdoctoral fellow at the Annenberg Public Policy Center (APPC) of the University of Pennsylvania. “The two-sided nature of the conversion message – presenting old beliefs and then refuting them – was more effective than a straightforward argument in favor of GM crops.”
“Conversion messages and attitude change: Strong arguments, not costly signals” was published in January 2019 in the journal Public Understanding of Science. The study was done by Lyons, now a research fellow at the University of Exeter, U.K., with two other former APPC postdoctoral fellows – Ariel Hasell, a research fellow at the University of Michigan, and Meghnaa Tallapragada, an assistant professor of strategic communication at Clemson University – and APPC Director Kathleen Hall Jamieson.
How the study worked In 2013, Lynas, a journalist and activist who had opposed GM crops, spoke at the Oxford Farming Conference about his change of belief. In the current experiment, APPC researchers used video excerpts from Lynas’ talk to more than 650 U.S. adult participants, who competed a survey about it.
The respondents each were shown one of three video clips: 1) Lynas explaining the benefits of GM crops; 2) Lynas discussing his prior beliefs and changing his mind about GM crops; and 3) Lynas explaining why his beliefs changed, including the realization that the anti-GM movement he helped to lead was a form of anti-science environmentalism.
The researchers found that both forms of the conversion message (2 and 3) were more influential than the simple advocacy message. There was no difference in impact between the basic conversion message and the more elaborate one.
Measuring how the conversion narrative worked, the researchers found that it enhanced Lynas’ “perceived argument strength,” rather than bolstering his personal credibility, which they found an important distinction. The fact that argument strength served as a mediator on GM attitudes supports the idea that “the unexpected shift in the position of the speaker … prompted central or systematic processing of the argument,” which, in turn, implies a more durable change in attitudes.
GM foods: A low-profile issue on which minds may be changed? Unlike other controversial issues in science such as evolution or climate change, Americans’ views on GM crops do not seem to be related to political ideology or religious beliefs. Nor are Americans especially knowledgeable about GM foods – one prior study found that only 43 percent of Americans know that GM foods are available for human consumption and only 26 percent believe that they have eaten food that was genetically modified. In another earlier study, 71 percent of Americans say they have heard little or nothing about GM foods – yet 39 percent think GM foods present a risk to human health.
Given that many Americans’ views on genetically modified foods aren’t yet fixed by group values and motivated reasoning [emphasis mine], their minds may be more easily changeable on this issue. Lyons said it may be possible to present scientific evidence through a conversion narrative to people on such low-knowledge, lower-profile issues and affect their views.
“After completing this study, I’m more optimistic about our ability to change minds on the issues that haven’t been totally polluted by ideology,” Lyons said.
The researchers cautioned that the findings may not extend beyond an American audience, and said that their audience included many who did not have strong pro- or anti-GM attitudes. They said conversion messaging should be tested with people who do have strong pre-existing views on GM foods. They also noted that this research tested a conversion in only one direction – from anti-GM to pro-GM foods – and said it would be valuable to explore the opposite case.

Here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,

Conversion messages and attitude change: Strong arguments, not costly signals by Benjamin A. Lyons, Ariel Hasell, Meghnaa Tallapragada, Kathleen Hall Jamieson. Public Understanding of Science. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0963662518821017 First Published January 10, 2019

This paper is behind a paywall

Curiosity may not kill the cat but, in science, it might be an antidote to partisanship

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I haven’t stumbled across anything from the Cultural Cognition Project at Yale Law School in years so before moving onto their latest news, here’s more about the project,

The Cultural Cognition Project is a group of scholars interested in studying how cultural values shape public risk perceptions and related policy beliefs. Cultural cognition refers to the tendency of individuals to conform their beliefs about disputed matters of fact (e.g., whether global warming is a serious threat; whether the death penalty deters murder; whether gun control makes society more safe or less) to values that define their cultural identities.Project members are using the methods of various disciplines — including social psychology, anthropology, communications, and political science — to chart the impact of this phenomenon and to identify the mechanisms through which it operates. The Project also has an explicit normative objective: to identify processes of democratic decisionmaking by which society can resolve culturally grounded differences in belief in a manner that is both congenial to persons of diverse cultural outlooks and consistent with sound public policymaking.

It’s nice to catch up with some of the project’s latest work, from a Jan. 26, 2017 Yale University news release (also on EurekAlert),

Disputes over science-related policy issues such as climate change or fracking often seem as intractable as other politically charged debates. But in science, at least, simple curiosity might help bridge that partisan divide, according to new research.

In a study slated for publication in the journal Advances in Political Psychology, a Yale-led research team found that people who are curious about science are less polarized in their views on contentious issues than less-curious peers.

In an experiment, they found out why: Science-curious individuals are more willing to engage with surprising information that runs counter to their political predispositions.

“It’s a well-established finding that most people prefer to read or otherwise be exposed to information that fits rather than challenges their political preconceptions,” said research team leader Dan Kahan, Elizabeth K. Dollard Professor of Law and professor of psychology at Yale Law School. “This is called the echo-chamber effect.”

But science-curious individuals are more likely to venture out of that chamber, he said.

“When they are offered the choice to read news articles that support their views or challenge them on the basis of new evidence, science-curious individuals opt for the challenging information,” Kahan said. “For them, surprising pieces of evidence are bright shiny objects — they can’t help but grab at them.”

Kahan and other social scientists previously have shown that information based on scientific evidence can actually intensify — rather than moderate — political polarization on contentious topics such as gun control, climate change, fracking, or the safety of certain vaccines. The new study, which assessed science knowledge among subjects, reiterates the gaping divide separating how conservatives and liberals view science.

Republicans and Democrats with limited knowledge of science were equally likely to agree or disagree with the statement that “there is solid evidence that global warming is caused by human activity. However, the most science-literate conservatives were much more likely to disagree with the statement than less-knowledgeable peers. The most knowledgeable liberals almost universally agreed with the statement.

“Whatever measure of critical reasoning we used, we always observed this depressing pattern: The members of the public most able to make sense of scientific evidence are in fact the most polarized,” Kahan said.

But knowledge of science, and curiosity about science, are not the same thing, the study shows.

The team became interested in curiosity because of its ongoing collaborative research project to improve public engagement with science documentaries involving the Cultural Cognition Project at Yale Law School, the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania, and Tangled Bank Studios at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.

They noticed that the curious — those who sought out science stories for personal pleasure — not only were more interested in viewing science films on a variety of topics but also did not display political polarization associated with contentious science issues.

The new study found, for instance, that a much higher percentage of curious liberals and conservatives chose to read stories that ran counter to their political beliefs than did their non-curious peers.

“As their science curiosity goes up, the polarizing effects of higher science comprehension dissipate, and people move the same direction on contentious policies like climate change and fracking,” Kahan said.

It is unclear whether curiosity applied to other controversial issues can minimize the partisan rancor that infects other areas of society. But Kahan believes that the curious from both sides of the political and cultural divide should make good ambassadors to the more doctrinaire members of their own groups.

“Politically curious people are a resource who can promote enlightened self-government by sharing scientific information they are naturally inclined to learn and share,” he said.

Here’s my standard link to and citation for the paper,

Science Curiosity and Political Information Processing by Dan M. Kahan, Asheley R Landrum, Katie Carpenter, Laura Helft, and Kathleen Hall Jamieson. Political Psychology Volume 38, Issue Supplement S1 February 2017 Pages 179–199 DOI: 10.1111/pops.12396View First published: 26 January 2017

This paper is open and it can also be accessed here.

I last mentioned Kahan and The Cultural Cognition Project in an April 10, 2014 posting (scroll down about 45% of the way) about responsible science.

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