scholarly journals Keeping science’s seat at the decision-making table: Mechanisms to motivate policy-makers to keep using scientific information in the age of disinformation

FACETS ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 1045-1064 ◽  
Author(s):  
Justin N. Marleau ◽  
Kimberly D. Girling
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Scientific Information ◽  
Public Support ◽  
Scientific Work ◽  
Multiple Streams ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Policy Interventions ◽  
Potential Benefits ◽  
The Uk

Policy-makers are confronted with complex problems that require evaluating multiple streams of evidence and weighing competing interests to develop and implement solutions. However, the policy interventions available to resolve these problems have different levels of supporting scientific evidence. Decision-makers, who are not necessarily scientifically trained, may favour policies with limited scientific backing to obtain public support. We illustrate these tensions with two case studies where the scientific consensus went up against the governing parties’ chosen policy. What mechanisms exist to keep the weight of scientific evidence at the forefront of decision-making at the highest levels of government? In this paper, we propose that Canada create “Departmental Chief Science Advisors” (DCSAs), based on a program in the UK, to help complement and extend the reach of the newly created Chief Science Advisor position. DCSAs would provide advice to ministers and senior civil servants, critically evaluate scientific work in their host department, and provide public outreach for the department’s science. We show how the DCSAs could be integrated into their departments and illustrate their potential benefits to the policy making process and the scientific community.

scholarly journals Addiction journals and the management of conflicts of interest

2016 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 9-10 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kerstin Stenius
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Drug Research ◽  
Conflicts Of Interest ◽  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Research Articles ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Research Findings ◽  
New Research ◽  
Political Decisions

Stenius, K. (2016). Addiction journals and the management of conflicts of interest. The International Journal Of Alcohol And Drug Research, 5(1), 9-10. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.7895/ijadr.v5i1.233Scientific journals are crucial for a critical and open exchange of new research findings and as guardians of the quality of science. Today, as policy makers increasingly justify decision-making with references to scientific evidence, and research articles form the basis for evidence for specific measures, journals also have an indirect responsibility for how political decisions will be shaped.

Some reasons why evidence from educational research is not particularly popular among (pre-service) teachers: A discussion

2021 ◽  
Vol 35 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 209-214
Author(s):  
Frank Fischer
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Teacher Education ◽  
Problem Solving ◽  
Educational Research ◽  
Information Sources ◽  
Research Evidence ◽  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Scientific Information ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
The Individual

Abstract. This discussion first highlights novel aspects that the individual articles contribute to the special issue on (future) teachers' choice, use, and evaluation of (non-)scientific information sources about educational topics. Among these highlights are the conceptualizations of epistemic goals and the type of pedagogical task as moderators of the selection and use of scientific evidence. The second part raises overarching questions, including the following: How inclusive do we want the concept of evidence to be? How should teachers use research evidence in their pedagogical problem-solving and decision-making? To what extent is multidisciplinary teacher education contributing to epistemological confusion, possibly leading to (pre-service) teachers' low appreciation of educational research?

scholarly journals Public Participation for Integrated Groundwater Management: The Case of Maneadero Valley, Baja California, Mexico

Water ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (17) ◽  
pp. 2326
Author(s):  
Mariana Villada-Canela ◽  
Dalia Marcela Muñoz-Pizza ◽  
Vanesa García-Searcy ◽  
Raquel Camacho-López ◽  
Luis Walter Daesslé ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Public Participation ◽  
Groundwater Management ◽  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Scientific Information ◽  
Limited Participation ◽  
Aquifer Management ◽  
Participation Mechanisms ◽  
Barriers And Challenges ◽  
Different Levels

There is a controversy in groundwater management: some people argue that public participation has decreased efficiency in decision-making, while others believe this process is not executed effectively. Questions about whether public participation results from the context involving influential people, the rules, or the way participation mechanisms were designed need examination. In this study, opportunities, barriers, and challenges of public participation were analyzed in the management of a coastal aquifer affected by marine intrusion in the Maneadero Valley, México. Mixed methods were implemented, involving 28 interviews with key actors and 50 surveys conducted during 2014 and 2017 with groundwater users. Results show that public participation is mainly determined by power differences, lack of continuity in the participatory processes, and the design of the participation mechanisms. State actors have greater decision-making power in integrated groundwater management. In contrast, groundwater users have limited participation in the process of making proposals, and their participation is generally passive. There are limitations to broad, informed, and responsible public participation: examples of these limitations include different levels of information, inappropriate institutional arrangements, failure to disseminate scientific information, lack of spaces to exercise public participation, and absence of political will. Hence, to improve Maneadero aquifer management, it is necessary to decentralize decision-making, integrate technical and non-technical knowledge, generate scientific evidence about water availability, and give a prominent role to stakeholders and users from the initial stages. In addition, internalization and water culture are required. These results can help to guide integrated groundwater management in other arid regions.

Estimating the costs associated with endemic diseases of dairy cattle

1999 ◽  
Vol 66 (3) ◽  
pp. 455-459 ◽  
Author(s):  
RICHARD M. BENNETT ◽  
KATHY CHRISTIANSEN ◽  
RICHARD S. CLIFTON-HADLEY
Keyword(s):  
Dairy Cattle ◽  
Economic Consequences ◽  
Farm Animals ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Endemic Diseases ◽  
Populations At Risk ◽  
Potential Benefits ◽  
Costs Of Disease ◽  
Different Populations ◽  
The Uk

A number of endemic diseases of dairy cattle cause significant losses to the dairy industry in the mainland UK (England, Scotland and Wales), both in terms of the reductions in output levels or wastage of resources incurred and the resource costs of disease prevention and treatment (Esslemont & Spincer, 1993; Esslemont & Kossaibati, 1996). Various studies have estimated the costs associated with different diseases (Bennett, 1992). However, these studies use different methods of assessment, relate to different populations at risk, refer to different points in time and utilize different ways of measuring disease and valuations of the effects of disease on production. Thus, it is difficult to use these studies for any comparative assessment of the magnitude of output losses and resource wastage incurred as a result of different diseases. Such information is useful in exploring both the economic consequences of diseases and the potential benefits of research on improved disease control (Howe, 1991; McInerney, 1996).This paper presents analyses of the impacts on production of five endemic diseases and conditions of dairy cattle in mainland UK: bovine viral diarrhoea (BVD), fasciolosis, lameness, leptospirosis and mastitis (including summer mastitis). These analyses follow from a preliminary economic study of the impacts on livestock production of some 30 non-notifiable diseases and conditions of farm animals (Bennett et al. 1997). The study was funded by the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food in the UK, with the (eventual) aim of providing information to policy makers that might help them to reach decisions on allocating funds to research into livestock diseases. Full details of the analyses are available from the website address given at the end of this paper.

scholarly journals Reflecting on Children and Young People's Participation in the UK

2008 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. 343-354 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Gallagher ◽  
Kay M. Tisdall ◽  
John Davis
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Service User ◽  
User Involvement ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Service User Involvement ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Advantages And Disadvantages ◽  
Current Trends ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Public Decision

AbstractThe article interrogates how children and young people's participation in public decision-making has been promoted in the UK. It considers critically the reasons typically (and persuasively) put forward for such participation, which can be categorized as: the promotion of children's rights; alignment with consumerism and service user involvement; enhancing democracy; and developing children's well-being and development. Each of these reasons can appeal to particular agendas of policy-makers, professionals and other influential adults, to provide room and support for participation. But inevitably each reason has certain advantages and disadvantages, acted out in current trends and accompanying dilemmas in children and young people's participation activities.

scholarly journals Information-seeking behaviors and barriers to the incorporation of scientific evidence into clinical practice: A survey with Brazilian dentists

PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. e0249260
Author(s):  
Branca Heloisa Oliveira ◽  
Izabel Monteiro D. Hyppolito ◽  
Zilson Malheiros ◽  
Bernal Stewart ◽  
Claudio Mendes Pannuti
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Clinical Practice ◽  
Clinical Training ◽  
Clinical Decision Making ◽  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Scientific Information ◽  
Clinical Decision ◽  
Dental Students ◽  
Southeastern Brazil ◽  
Bibliographic Databases

The aim of this online cross-sectional study is to identify the sources of scientific information used by Brazilian dentists in clinical decision-making and the barriers that they perceive as important to the incorporation of scientific evidence into clinical practice. A pretested questionnaire created in Google Forms which was made available to participants through links sent by e-mail or shared on Facebook® and Instagram® was used to collect the data between October 2018 and May 2019. Only dentists who were involved in direct or indirect care of patients (i.e. clinicians who performed dental procedures or dental educators who participated in the clinical training of graduate or postgraduate dental students) were asked to complete the questionnaire. The sample was comprised of 528 dentists (the response rate from the alumni database was 6.9%); their mean age was 45.2 years (±12.5) and 30.9% had an academic position. The majority were women (68.0%) and lived in Southern or Southeastern Brazil (96.0%). The sources of scientific information more frequently used by them in clinical decision-making were clinical guidelines (65.1%; 95% CI: 60.9, 69.2), scientific articles (56.8%; 95%CI: 52.5, 61.1) and bibliographic databases (48.3%; 95% CI: 43.9, 52.6). The information resource less frequently used was social media. The most important barriers to the clinical use of scientific evidence were: difficulty in determining whether scientific contents found on the Internet were reliable or not (41.8%; 95% CI: 37.6, 46.2), high cost of access to scientific papers (37.7%; 95% CI: 33.5, 41.9), and lack of time for reading scientific articles (32.4%; 95% CI: 28.4, 36.6). Although Brazilian dentists show a positive attitude towards obtaining scientific evidence from reliable sources, there still remain important barriers to the translation of evidence into practice. This can have significant implications for quality of care and should be further investigated.

Governing Irrationality, or a More Than Rational Government? Reflections on the Rescientisation of Decision Making in British Public Policy

2011 ◽  
Vol 43 (12) ◽  
pp. 2819-2837 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Whitehead ◽  
Rhys Jones ◽  
Jessica Pykett
Keyword(s):  
Public Policy ◽  
Decision Making ◽  
Behaviour Change ◽  
Human Cognition ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Political Consequences ◽  
Human Decision ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Ethical Critique ◽  
Behavioural Theories

It appears that recent debates within human geography, and the broader social sciences, concerning the more-than-rational constitution of human decision making are now being paralleled by changes in the ways in which public policy makers are conceiving of and addressing human behaviour. This paper focuses on the rise of so-called Behaviour Change policies in public policy in the UK. Behaviour Change policies draw on the behavioural insights being developed within the neuro-sciences, behavioural economics, and psychology. These new behavioural theories suggest not only that human decision making relies on a previously overlooked irrational component, but that the irrationality of decision making is sufficiently consistent to enable effective public policy intervention into the varied times and spaces that surround human decisions. This paper charts the emergence of Behaviour Change policies within a range of British public policy sectors, and the political and scientific antecedents of such policies. Ultimately, the paper develops a geographically informed, ethical critique of the contemporary Behaviour Change regime that is emerging in the UK. Drawing on thirty in-depth interviews with leading policy executives, and case studies that reflect the application of Behaviour Change policies on the design and constitution of British streets, the analysis claims that current strategies are predicated on a partial reading of new behavioural theories. We argue that this partial reading of human cognition is leading to the construction of public policies that seek to arbitrarily decouple the rational and emotional components of human decision making with deleterious social and political consequences.

Mental models, communication, and engagement in marine projects

2017 ◽  
Vol 74 (7) ◽  
pp. 2034-2039 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fabio Boschetti ◽  
Matthew Andreotta
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Mental Models ◽  
Information Needs ◽  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Scientific Information ◽  
Third Party ◽  
Engagement Process ◽  
Causal Layered Analysis ◽  
Common Framework ◽  
Complex Decision Making

Abstract In a hypothetical decision-making situation in which a unique truth exists and each party’s aim in acquiring knowledge is to approach the truth, argumentation would be unnecessary because the best scientific theory would win the argument. Likewise, if truth is irrelevant and a perfect persuasion method is available, argumentation would also be pointless, because arguing parties, each possessing the perfect recipe, would lead a third party to switch sides endlessly. In the real world, argumentation matters because a unique truth rarely exists, information can be uncertain or vague, aims are often ambiguous if not contradictory, and acquiring knowledge can have other purposes besides approaching the truth. Marine scientists are increasingly expected to contribute to complex decision-making by providing not only scientific evidence, but also impact in the form of effective communication and persuasion. Here we review insights from different disciplines on how humans organise knowledge, beliefs, opinions, assumptions and worldviews, how these interrelate and how they affect decision-making as well as the reception of information. By focussing on the theory of mental models and the Causal Layered Analysis we also show how the structure underlying the organisation of scientific and non-scientific knowledge can be reduced to a fairly common framework. We conclude by reviewing some tools a marine scientist can employ in a stakeholder engagement process in order to better understand the audience to which scientific information needs to be delivered.

Risk versus Hazard – How to Regulate in the 21st Century

2011 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 149-168 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ragnar E. Lofstedt
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Chemical Compounds ◽  
Regulatory Agencies ◽  
Expert Interviews ◽  
Brominated Flame Retardant ◽  
Member States ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Regulatory Decision ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Uk

In Europe, debate as to whether one should regulate chemicals based on intrinsic hazard or assessment of risk, or possibly a combination of both, has been gaining momentum. This article first provides a brief history of this risk versus hazard debate. Secondly, it examines how European regulators are currently handling the regulation of two chemical compounds, namely Bisphenol A and Deca BDE (a brominated flame retardant), based on forty-five expert interviews with regulators, policy makers and industry representatives in eight Member States, as well as with European Commission officials. The paper shows that there is no clear consensus as to when risk or hazard considerations should be the basis for regulatory decision-making, with wide discrepancies between Member States (e.g. the UK is overall more risk based than Sweden) and between regulatory agencies within Member States. The penultimate section puts forward a series of recommendations to help regulators and policy makers develop more consistent and science based regulations for Europe.

scholarly journals Improving the use of evidence in legislatures: the case of the UK Parliament

2020 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. 619-638
Author(s):  
David Christian Rose ◽  
Caroline Kenny ◽  
Abbi Hobbs ◽  
Chris Tyler
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Research Evidence ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Relevant Information ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Factors Affecting ◽  
Advisory Groups ◽  
Science Advisory ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Use Of Research

Despite claims that we now live in a post-truth society, it remains commonplace for policy makers to consult research evidence to increase the robustness of decision making. Few scholars of evidence-policy interfaces, however, have used legislatures as sites of study, despite the fact that they play a critical role in modern democracies. There is thus limited knowledge of how research evidence is sourced and used in legislatures, which presents challenges for academics and science advisory groups, as well as to others interested in ensuring that democratic decisions are evidence-informed. Here, we present results from an empirical study into the use of research in the UK Parliament, obtained through the use of a mixed methodology, including interviews and surveys of 157 people in Parliament, as well as an ethnographic investigation of four committees. Here we are specifically interested in identifying the factors affecting the use of research evidence in Parliament with the aim of improving its use. We focus on providing advice for the Higher Education Sector, which includes improving knowledge of, and engagement in, parliamentary processes, reform of academic incentives to stimulate the production of policy-relevant information and to assist engagement, and working with trusted knowledge brokers. Implementing this advice should improve the chances that parliamentary decision making is informed by research evidence.

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