Studies Centre on Science, Communication and Society, Department of Experimental and Health Sciences, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain.
Group of Educational Research in Health Sciences, Department of Experimental and Health Sciences, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain.
PLoS One. 2019 Nov 13;14(11):e0224262. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0224262. eCollection 2019.
The increasing perception that public communication in science and technology is an important tool to create a knowledge society is encouraging numerous public engagement activities. However, too little is known about scientists' opinions of and attitudes towards the public with whom they interact during these activities, especially in southern European countries such as Spain. If we want to establish an effective dialogue between science and society, we need to be aware of the opinions and perceptions that both parties have of each other. In this study, we address this issue by focusing on 1022 responses to a survey conducted among scientists in Spain to discover their views of the public, and we then compare these responses with data from other national surveys on the public's understanding of science. The results show that approximately 75% of Spanish scientists think that the general public has a serious lack of knowledge and understanding of scientific reasoning, although scientists do recognize that science interests the public (73%). Scientists believe that the public values the scientific profession to a lesser extent than suggested by public surveys: on a scale of 1-5, survey respondents rate their valuation of the scientific profession at 4.22, whereas scientists rate the public's valuation of the profession at 3.12, on average. Significant differences were detected between scientists' perceptions of how citizens are informed about science and what citizens report in surveys. The challenge for the future is to narrow this gap in order to help scientists gain a better understanding of the public and their interests and to make public engagement activities more effective.
公众对科技传播作为构建知识社会的重要工具的认识不断提高，这促使了大量公众参与活动的开展。然而，人们对科学家在这些活动中与公众互动时的看法和态度知之甚少，尤其是在西班牙等南欧国家。如果我们想在科学和社会之间建立有效的对话，就需要了解双方对彼此的看法和看法。在这项研究中，我们通过关注西班牙科学家的 1022 份调查回复，来解决这个问题，以发现他们对公众的看法，然后将这些回复与其他关于公众对科学理解的国家调查数据进行比较。结果表明，大约 75%的西班牙科学家认为，公众对科学推理严重缺乏了解和认识，尽管科学家们确实认识到科学是公众感兴趣的(73%)。科学家们认为，公众对科学职业的重视程度低于公众调查所显示的程度：在 1-5 的范围内，调查受访者对科学职业的评价为 4.22，而科学家对公众对该职业的评价平均为 3.12。科学家们对公民了解科学的方式的看法与公民在调查中的报告之间存在显著差异。未来的挑战是缩小这一差距，以帮助科学家更好地了解公众及其利益，并使公众参与活动更加有效。
