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A recent study from the University of Michigan found that the American public’s trust in science has been consistently high since 1957. The results suggest that people’s trust in scientific expertise increased between 2016 and 2020, but they also show that people’s beliefs about science have become more polarized. . The study was conducted by John Miller, a fellow emeritus at the Institute for Social Research, and Mark Ackerman, a professor in the School of Information Studies.
Miller began the data collection process in 1988. He told the Michigan Daily that he was inspired by a study conducted at the university in 1957. The survey asked three questions about people’s beliefs about the benefits of science and three questions about how concerned they were about the impact of science. The data collected in this paper includes the original 1957 survey, as well as his four replica surveys conducted by Miller in 1988, 2007, 2016, and 2020.
The 2016 and 2020 surveys also asked participants about their level of belief in scientific expertise. In 2016, 75.7% of the public had moderate trust in scientific expertise, while 22% had high or very high levels of trust and 2.4% had low or very low levels of trust. I had trust. However, in 2020, 57.2% of the public had high or very high trust in scientific expertise, 29.4% had a medium level of trust, and 13.2% had a low or very low level of trust. had. Miller said part of the change was due to divisive rhetoric spread by former President Trump.
“What happened was that the middle shrunk,” Miller said. “The good thing for scientists is that more people have moved to high trust rather than low trust. … People are listening to President Trump say that you can cure the coronavirus by putting household cleaners into your bloodstream.” People were smarter than to listen when they had to listen.”
In addition to providing data about the general public, the survey also collected information about participants to identify factors that predict individual attitudes toward science. Specifically, in 2016, the two biggest predictors of whether people perceived science as useful were, by a significant margin, attention to science and college science course taking. It turned out to be a large amount. In 2020, these remained the most predictive factors, along with citizens’ scientific literacy, educational background, and high trust in scientific expertise. In both 2016 and 2020, religious fundamentalism was the most important predictor of whether someone was concerned about science.
Partisan identity does not appear to be a particularly important predictor of scientific attitudes in both 2016 and 2020. Ackerman said a potential explanation for why partisanship plays a less important role, despite President Trump’s anti-science rhetoric, is that science policy tends to be a low-profile issue. Ta. Something that most people don’t consider.
“Most people will pick two or three things that bother them when they judge different candidates,” Ackerman says. “Science policy is usually not part of that.”
The survey found that 18% of the population has good knowledge and interest in science and technology.
Kyle Brown, a sophomore at LSA majoring in political science, said he expected politics to play a less important role in people’s trust in science.
“I think people like to think that[science]is becoming more politicized and more mistrusted, but I don’t think overall public attitudes have changed that much,” Brown said. “We still trust products that companies make based on science. We still trust scientific discoveries in medicine.”
Daily staff reporter Liam McCarney can be contacted at: mccl@umich.edu.
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