What the Public Thinks and Knows About Science—and Why It Matters

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
William K. Hallman
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Science Literacy ◽  
Public Understanding Of Science ◽  
Public Understanding ◽  
Scientific Methods ◽  
The Public ◽  
Civic Discourse ◽  
Scientific Institutions ◽  
Understanding Of Science ◽  
Over Time

Modern conceptions of science literacy include knowledge of science facts; a grasp of scientific methods, norms, and practices; awareness of current discoveries and controversies involving science and refinement of the ability to comprehend and evaluate their implications; the capability to assess the priorities and actions of scientific institutions; and the capacity to engage in civic discourse and decision-making with regard to specific issues involving science. Advocates of increased science literacy maintain that widespread public understanding of science benefits individuals, culture, society, the economy, the nation, democracy, and science itself. This chapter argues that the relatively crude measures currently employed to assess science literacy are insufficient to demonstrate these outcomes. It is difficult to know whether these benefits are real and are independent of greater levels of education. Existing measures should be supplanted by multidimensional scales that are parsimonious, easy to administer, reliable, and valid over time and across cultures.

scholarly journals Multiple erfaringer i multiple settinger – MEMUS, et teoretisk rammeverk for museumsformidling

1970 ◽  
pp. 51
Author(s):  
Merethe Frøyland
Keyword(s):  
Multiple Intelligences ◽  
Museum Studies ◽  
Theoretical Framework ◽  
Public Understanding Of Science ◽  
Public Understanding ◽  
The Public ◽  
Educational Programmes ◽  
Theory Of Multiple Intelligences ◽  
Understanding Of Science ◽  
Over Time

Museum pedagogics and the theory of multiple intelligences, The paper proposes a theoretical framework for how museums might contribute to improving the public understanding of science. The theory suggests that multiple experiences, based on the concept of multiple intelligences in multiple settings (MEMUS), increase the possibility of achieving understanding in a variety of areas. MEMUS includes two perspectives on learning: first that learning is an individual process and second that learning is a process over time. These two perspectives should affect the way museums organise their exhibitions, educational programmes etc, and the topics they choose to present to their visitors. Examples, based on recent international museum studies, are given of how museums can provide their vistitors with multiple experiences. 

Public uptake of science: a case for institutional reflexivity

1993 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 321-337 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brian Wynne
Keyword(s):  
Sociology Of Science ◽  
The Other ◽  
Public Understanding Of Science ◽  
Public Understanding ◽  
The Public ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Scientific Institutions ◽  
Understanding Of Science ◽  
Epistemological Principle ◽  
The Relationship

This paper attempts to advance the notion of reflexivity as a key element of improving current understanding of the public understanding of science problem, and for improving the relations between science and its public more generally. By reflexivity here I mean more systematic processes of exploration of the prior commitments framing knowledge, in the way it has been introduced in sociological debates on modernity, rather than the more methodological-epistemological principle of consistency as it has been developed in sociology of science. The dominant framing of the public understanding of science issue corresponds with wider assumptions about the relationship between science and laypeople. Laypeople are assumed to be essentially defensive, risk- and uncertainty-averse, and unreflexive. Science on the other hand is assumed to be the epitome of reflexive self-criticism. This paper draws upon research in PUS to show that laypeople display considerable reflexive negotiation of their identity in relationships to science and scientific institutions. The latter, on the other hand, show considerable deep resistance to recognizing and reconsidering the unstated models of the public which structure their scientific discourses. This only makes the public understanding problem worse. Reflexive institutions would be needed to place science-public interactions on a more constructive footing.

Understanding understanding: a model for the public learning of radioactivity

1999 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 267-284 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steve Alsop
Keyword(s):  
Informal Learning ◽  
Background Radiation ◽  
Public Understanding Of Science ◽  
Public Understanding ◽  
Change Model ◽  
Potential Health ◽  
The Public ◽  
Understanding Of Science ◽  
Conceptual Change Model

While much of the work in the public understanding of science has focused on the public's appreciation of science and their familiarity with key scientific concepts, understanding the processes involved in learning science has largely been ignored. This article documents a study of how particular members of the public learn about radiation and radioactivity, and proposes a model to describe their learning—the Informal Conceptual Change Model [ICCM]. ICCM is a multidimensional framework that incorporates three theoretical dimensions—the cognitive, conative, and affective. The paper documents each of these dimensions, and then illustrates the model by drawing upon data collected in a case study. The emphasis of the analysis is on understanding how the members of the public living in an area with high levels of background radiation learn about the science of this potential health threat. The summarizing comments examine the need for a greater awareness of the complexities of informal learning.

The roles of rhetoric in the public understanding of science

1994 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-23 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan G. Gross
Keyword(s):  
Rhetorical Analysis ◽  
Public Understanding Of Science ◽  
Public Understanding ◽  
Minor Role ◽  
Contextual Model ◽  
Deficit Model ◽  
The Public ◽  
Science Rhetoric ◽  
Understanding Of Science ◽  
Social Scientific

In the public understanding of science, rhetoric has two distinct roles: it is both a theory capable of analysing public understanding and an activity capable of creating it. In its analytical role, rhetoric reveals two dominant models of public understanding: the deficit model and the contextual model. In the deficit model, rhetoric acts in the minor role of creating public understanding by accommodating the facts and methods of science to public needs and limitations. In the contextual model, rhetoric and rhetorical analysis play major roles. Rhetorical analysis provides an independent source of evidence to secure social scientific claims; in addition, it supplies the grounds for a rhetoric of reconstruction, one that reconstitutes the fact and facts of science in the public interest.

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