Communicating Controversial Science

One of the great things about being based at Victoria University is that there are always lots of events such as lunchtime seminars that you can go along and attend. One I went to recently was called Communicating Controversial Science.  It was presented by Dr Rebecca Priestley and Dr Rhian Salmon who are both lecturers in the School of Chemical and Physical Sciences.

The seminar focused on how scientists can go about communicating 'controversial science' to the public. Just about any area of science can become controversial, but some of the examples we were looking at were fluoridation of water supplies, vaccinations, climate change, nuclear energy, cloning, genetically modified food and nanotechnology.

In the seminar we divided into three groups - chemists, nanotechnologists and nuclear scientists.  Firstly each group took the perspective of members of the public concerned about one of the other two areas.  We listed concerns that people might have.  For example, people worried about nuclear power might have concerns about radioactive materials getting into the environment or a nuclear accident such as happened at Chernobyl. The 'specialist' groups then considered those concerns and discussed ways to communicate the relevant science to the public in order to reassure them.

Until about 2000 the main model used by scientists when communicating with the public was what is now referred to as the deficit model. This model assumed that people knew very little about the relevant science and the scientist's role was to educate them. It was thought that once people had been informed of the scientific facts, they would change their views and support the new technology or scientific theory.  However, this approach has been shown to be largely ineffective.  This is partly because it does not take into account people's existing knowledge (which may or may not be scientifically accurate), or their beliefs and personal experience.  Critically, it does not provide for people to have their say and enter into any dialogue with the scientist.

After 2000 a dialogue model of science communication became more commonly accepted.  Under this model the scientist and non-scientist engage in discussion where the non-scientist is able to voice their perspective, understandings and beliefs.  However, the scientist still views their role as one of bringing the other person around to accepting the science viewpoint.

This model has now evolved further to an engagement model.  This model recognizes that effective science communication requires a genuine respect for people's current knowledge, values, perspectives and goals. The objective is not to convince people to adopt your viewpoint, but rather to provide expert knowledge and to then accept that people will use a combination of that scientific knowledge and their own understandings and values when deciding what position they will adopt. Decisions around the application of scientific knowledge in communities are the responsibility of all members of the community.  It is the role of scientists to bring scientific evidence to the debate, but all citizens have the right to participate in the debate, to have their own viewpoint respected and to apply their own values in their decision-making.

An interesting paper about the changing nature of science communication can be found at: http://tinyurl.com/qbp4wxq