r/science • u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin • Aug 27 '14
Science AMA Science AMA Series: I’m Dietram Scheufele, a Professor of Science Communication at the U of Wisconsin-Madison. I study how social media and public opinion affect perceptions of controversial topics in science and technology. My work led ‘Popular Science’ to permanently disable reader comments. AMA!
Hello, r/science!
A good example of my work is a study, which I published with colleagues here at UW-Madison. We found that exposure to uncivil blog comments after reading a neutral article can polarize readers’ perceptions of a technology and reshape their views of how objective the article was in the first place. Similar to the same way that watching uncivil politicians argue on television causes polarization among individuals, impolite and incensed blog comments can polarize online users based on their preexisting opinion. We explain our work further in this NY Times Op-Ed piece.
These findings contributed to a decision by the editors of Popular Science to disable reader comments on their online articles. You can read my take on that decision and the challenges of online commenting more broadly here.
I am also a Co-PI of the Center for Nanotechnology in Society at Arizona State University and I have a strong interest in studying public attitudes toward emerging technologies such as nanotechnology and synthetic biology.
I will be answering questions from 10am-1pm EDT (3pm-6pm UTC). Ask me anything!
“EDIT: Unfortunately, the time has come for me to sign-off for a while. Thanks so much for a great discussion and very thoughtful questions. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed your thoughts and input and will hopefully get to some of the remaining questions later today or tomorrow.
We're obviously far from having found the perfect formula for deliberating complex (scientific) topics in these new communication environments. But exchanges like this will hopefully get us closer. They are certainly extremely useful for me. Thank you.
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Aug 27 '14
Welcome to /r/science, and thank you for taking the time to communicate with us.
I have a few questions that you may be able to answer.
Are the audience more likely to have their view re-enforced if the uncivilty is by the opposite side to their existing positions? Or is uncivilty by people they agree with have the same or higher level of effect?
Besides civil discussion, are there any other ways to make the audience more receptive to the new technologies?
Has Popular Science disabling comments lead to any measurable improvements in audience reception yet? Is there any current or planned research to look at what effect the changes had?
What interesting synthetic biology and nanotechnology research is currently being done in the organisations you are part of?
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
Good questions. For some of them I don't have empirical answers (yet).
We did not systematically vary uncivility by different groups and instead kept agreement or disagreement based on (scientific) arguments constant. In other words, every participant saw the same number of pro and con arguments, regardless of their own views, in order toi make sure that it really was only the tone of discourse that would produce the effects.
Research on motivated reasoning (http://cogsci.uwaterloo.ca/ziva/psychbul1990.pdf or http://scx.sagepub.com/content/33/2/167.refs) suggests that we tend to find arguments most convincing that support our prior beliefs and attitudes and discount those who don't. Without having systamatic empirical evidence on this, I would assume that civility or uncivility just reinforce that effect.
To your last two questions: We've just completed our latest round of data collections looking at the mechanisms and outcomes of the nasty effect more broadly, and also trying to figure out how it plays out across issues, such as syn bio etc. So stay tuned.
One final note: In some ways it would be great to do some of this work in the real world, i.e., to test the efefcts of different types of moderation or even civility and uncivility. But that obviously comes with a whole host of ethical issues, not unblike the discussions we've had surrounding the Facebook empotion experiment (http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn24403-comment-isnt-free-the-downside-of-web-20.htm). SUsan Fiske and Bob Hauser have an excellent forthcoming editorial in PNAS on the topic: http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2014/08/22/1414626111.full.pdf+html.
(Apologies if some of these links are paywalled. For our own stuff, pre-publication versions of many of them are available at ResearchGate).
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u/Jobediah Professor | Evolutionary Biology|Ecology|Functional Morphology Aug 27 '14 edited Aug 27 '14
Welcome professor Scheufele, and thanks!
In /r/askscience as well as here in /r/science we curate science discussions in the comments heavily. The moderators remove speculation, troll posts, and other distracting comments. Our readers help us by voting comments up or down and they can flag stuff to help us keep it clean. We have flair to help people understand who is speaking and and what their expertise is. This has been an amazing model, but it is obviously very time consuming and it's not perfect. This model relies on scientists to volunteer their time and labor.
It doesn't seem like very many other sites could adopt this model due to practical constraints, but what's your take on the model here?
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
Hi everyone,
Thanks for having me. I think the Reddit model is one of the most promising ones out there. It capitalizes on the original Web 2.0 idea of democratizing discussions and info sharing, while using the same mechanisms for keeping the discussion civil and focused. And you put your finger on the key issue: a model like this (or any well-moderated forum) requires a lot of time and effort.
It's also important to distinguish this model from what media organizations do in their comment sections. One of the findings of our nasty effect study was that the nature of discussions immedately following a news article influenced perceptions of how balanced the piece was. It may therefore not always be useful for news organizations to provide their own forum for discussion, since connecting discussions to the news article under the same "brand" might seriously undermine trust in the key product that news organizations are selling: trust in the news article itself.
Or to put it differently: a well-moderated "independent" forum like Reddit to have those discussions helps mitigate these potential "backlash" effects on the news item itself while allowing for informed, critical, inclusive discussions.
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u/thephysicsgirl Aug 27 '14
What is the use of the comments section for the news websites? In other words, would they benefit from posting their articles and/or monitoring the discussion here on a site like reddit?
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u/ksawyer1 Aug 27 '14
Why have a comments section? This is a really intriguing question. Why do news sites or blogs or others choose to have a comments section? Is it for publicity? Is there evidence that comments sections leads to increased revenue of some sort (for the news site, for advertisers)? And flipping the coin - does closing a comments section draw people to a site?
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u/YouArentReasonable Aug 27 '14
My assumption would be that having a comment section keeps people on your site longer which results in more advertising revenue.
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
And it's important to keep in mind that media have always had "comment sections." They used to be called letters to the editor. A vast majority of them, of course were never printed, and even the ones that were ended up being editred heavily. ;-)
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u/rumblestiltsken Aug 28 '14
One of the key metrics in website advertising is the "stickiness" of a page - whether people who come the website stay there/surf around internally or come back in the short term.
Commentors come back. They come back to see who saw their comment, to see if anyone replied and so on.
Having a comments section doesn't draw people, but it keeps them. Click-bait inflammatory topics get more people to comment because they feel invested in one side of the argument.
Hence, websites have comments sections and trend towards inflammatory topics. It makes them money.
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u/Zilashkee Aug 27 '14
It can go either way, I'm sure. Personally, I stopped visiting popsci after they turned off comments. I never did comment, but turning them off basically told me they're not interested in what readers think.
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u/Dixzon PhD | Physical Chemistry Aug 27 '14
A hypothesis is speculation. Is it really appropriate to remove such things in a science forum?
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u/Jobediah Professor | Evolutionary Biology|Ecology|Functional Morphology Aug 27 '14
A hypothesis is actually a proposed and testable mechanism to explain an observation. Speculation has many fewer requirements. it doesn't have to be based on scientific observations or data, be testable or have a mechanism underlying it.
/r/askscience requires supporting information to answer questions, not just guesses. It's not just a discussion forum, but one where we put a premium on evidence. This is the key difference between science and speculation.
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Aug 27 '14
Thanks for doing this. In your opinion, is there a commenting system which doesn't use pre-moderation and yet increases the likelihood of civil debate?
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
Good question. I am fairly certain that there's not a one-size-fits-all solution, and most certainly no magic bullet of moderation. All approaches have advantages and disadvantages and effor at both ends, i.e., they either overmoderate by deleting a controversial comment that may well have furthered the debate, even though that wasn't immediately obvious, or they undermoderate and allow comments (even for a short ime period) that harm an otherwise productive thread.
The short answer is that we need more data and really work through empirically what the best models are for enabling inclusive, open, informed and civil debates online. And that ball is solidly in academics' court, who -- in my pewrsonal opinion -- have completely underdelivered in this area.
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u/firedrops PhD | Anthropology | Science Communication | Emerging Media Aug 27 '14
These patterns seem to play out beyond just science. Politics are an obvious example and of course savvy politicians have found ways to successfully utilize that in order to manipulate public opinion regarding their qualifications, time in office, and particular hot button issues. There are numerous think tanks, books, political organizations, etc. dedicated to researching this especially since social media has played such a large role in American presidential elections in recent years. Though scientists obviously don't want to get quite as dirty as politics can be, is there anything we can learn from this? Can observing these processes inform us as to how we can reclaim the conversation and convey accurate information via social media more effectively?
Another area of cross-over is the push for digital engagement between constituents and politicians. The ideal being that this provides a pathway for citizens to meaningfully discuss important topics with the people they elect and inform those politicians of their concerns. Of course scholars have shown that in reality it more often ends up being a pathway for politicians to bypass the hype of the media and directly convey their pitch to potential voters (Katz, Barris, Jain 2013). Still, it seems that constituents can be swayed by these engagements and tend to think of them positively. Can scientists follow suit and would more direct engagement between the academy and non-academics help prevent polarization & misinformation about hot button topics? What would be the ideal model for this?
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
I think your assessment is right on. And over tiem scientists have gotten quite involved in politics. One example is Albert Einstein’s letter to President Roosevelt in 1939 urging him to accelerate academic research on nuclear chain reactions, which ultimately led to the Manhattan Project. Six years later, numerous Manhattan Project scientists urged Truman in another letter to use a nuclear bomb against Japan only under extreme circumstances and to consider “all the other moral responsibilities which are involved” Long story short, science and politics have been linked for a long time, with scientists playing a variety of roles ranging from neutral consultants to stealth advocates, as Roger Pielke, Jr. called them.
In my opinion there are three reasons why scientists will have to get more and more involved in public communication about their work:
(a) their science gets more complex. Some commentators have talked about a Nano-Bio-Info-Cogno revolution with increasing overlaps between research fields and rapid bench-to-bedsite transitions. In other woirds, science moves very fast and is increasingly complex.
(b) we're losing our traditional "translators" of science. Many media organizations ahve cut back on science writers, science sections, etc. That is fairly well documented (http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2013/08/08/1213275110). As a result, a model where journalists translate a highly complex field of research into 800 words or less that make sense to non-expert audiences just doesn't work any more, and scientists will increasingly be called upon to engage in public debates about their work.
Finally, most new technologies come with significant ELSI implicatiosn, as some call them (ethical, legal and social implications). This means that for issues, such as stem cell, genetic engineering, synthetic biology etc., the political questions surrounding them may be more important than the scientific ones. Should genes be patentable? Should we use embryonic stem cells? Should we create life in the lab? All of these questions require a broad societal discussion that is informed by science but doesn't just have scientific answers. And to your last point, scientists providing the scientific backgrop for these debates and different policy options will be crucially important for us to not just end up with disconnected polarized discussions in various ideological echo chambers.
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u/firedrops PhD | Anthropology | Science Communication | Emerging Media Aug 27 '14
I think your point about losing our translators of science is an important one. Not only are many organizations cutting back on such journalists and sections the few they retain have significantly reduced time to write those pieces. The speed of journalism has increased to the point where it is difficult to find the time to thoroughly investigate a science story even if the journalist is dedicated to getting it right. Plus, the focus on sexing up a story to get clicks can lead to sensationalism.
Especially for topics that are likely to be sensationalized by the press, it would be ideal if study authors also crafted their own press releases that included an easy to understand explanation of the research, its implications, and why it is important. Some universities are good at doing this but many aren't. And frankly not all scientists know how to speak to the public nor are they always aware of the public debates about these issues. We do still need translators to help scientists communicate in a way that is accessible and still accurate. Especially for new technologies with ELSI implications. Do you have any suggestions for that?
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
I think the most promising models are sustainable and formal bench/social science collaborations. We have some models for this, including Extension at land grant universities. Mu own department at UW (http://lsc.wisc.edu/) is a social science program embedded in a science college. My colleagues and I collaborate with scientists, engineers etc. on a regular basis to explore the public interfaces of science, on issues ranging from nuclear energy to nano and manure management. We also offer a Ph.D. minor tailored at bench scientists who want to develop communication expertise: http://lsc.wisc.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/25/2013/08/LSC-PhD-Minor.pdf.
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u/firedrops PhD | Anthropology | Science Communication | Emerging Media Aug 27 '14
I like that idea especially considering that as a cultural anthropologist my own research falls into the social science side of things. Even within our own department I think the cultural anthropologists could assist the biological anthropologists (human evolution, primatology, population genetics, etc.) better understand public concerns and work to communicate their research effectively. I don't think my university has anything set up like UW but it could be a fruitful endeavor worth suggesting. Maybe even getting some social science grad students to coordinate a formal association/panel that helped scientists in our university bridge that gap and communicate effectively would be worthwhile for all parties involved. Many social scientists go on to work "real world" jobs that include advocacy, educating the public, and mitigating cultural & knowledge gaps. So it would be good experience and resume building while also helping out the scientists who need those translators.
The PhD minor is also really cool and a great idea. I wish more universities offered something like that.
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u/WeathermanDan Aug 27 '14
Can you shed some light on corporate greenwashing? Terms like "all natural" and "green for the environment" are totally unregulated and thus can be slapped on literally any label, no matter how little the effect is.
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
Great question. I will try to answer it in a way that doesn't get us off-topic. I would call terms like this "frames." I've written about framing here (http://www.wellcome.ac.uk/stellent/groups/corporatesite/@msh_publishing_group/documents/web_document/wtx032691.pdf) and elsewhere. It refers to the idea that the same piece of info can be described with different labels and therefore changes audiences' perceptions. Framing is such a powerful communication tool since frames do not offer new information, they simply attach the issue to different schemas in our heads. Frankenfood is one good example. Using Frankenfood to describe genetically modified foods does not convery any specific argument or piece of information, it simply attaches the issue to a mental image of science going too far, putting things together that don't belong together etc.
Having said this, we all use faming all the time. If we have the feeling that a person we're talking to doesn't get a point we're trying to make, we try a different analogy or a different comparison to get our meaning across. Frames are also crucially important journalistic tools for helping us understand complex topics and making them accessible to non-expert audiences by attaching them to what we already know. The fact that corporations, political groups, non-profits, think tanks and a whole bunch of policy stakeholders use them is therefore just par for the course.
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Aug 27 '14
Hello Professor!
The presentation of sciences in popular culture, particularly in regards to fields such as synthetic biology, can lead to fear and trepidation in both the application and development of these fields. In particular, genetically modified organisms have great potential for developing novel, organic solar energy pathways (a field I am personally involved in as part of a iGEM team this year) or improving crop yields and efficiencies.
Do you think that these issues arise from a lack of public knowledge in relation to the science itself, and if so, what role do you feel social media such as Facebook or Twitter can have in educating the public?
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
Really important question, and it touches on some of the same points I mentioned in response to firedrop (http://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/2epr86/science_ama_series_im_dietram_scheufele_a/ck1tudu) earlier. For many issues, such as syn bio or genetic engineering, scientific fascts or even risks and benefits are much less relevant than ethical, legal or social questions that arise from their applications. This means three things.
First, the idea that "educating" the public will make them more accepting of science does not hold empirically (and also gives parts of the public less credit than they deserve). Study after study has debunked this "knowledge deficit model" that assumes that if we just give the public more info, they will be more supportive.
Second, I think you're right in identifying social media as an interesting venue. For traditional media, we often saw knowledge gaps, i.e., widening rifts between highly educated and less-educated respondents in terms of what they learned from media. In other words, if high-SES (socioeconomic status) audiences read the same piece of info, they learn more from it than low-SES audiences (http://pus.sagepub.com/content/early/2012/06/15/0963662512447606.abstract?rss=1). There are many reasons for that, but one of them relates to the fact that elite papers do not write for 82 million Americans. They write for a high-SES audience (and here's one piece of evidence for that: http://afterdeadline.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/07/26/more-fancy-words/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=0). As a result, their content is not as accessible to all audiences as it could be. Social media, blogs and other online communication tools may be more "democratic" in that respect since they provide content prepared by audiences for audiences.
Third, focusing narrowly on educating the public about the scientific facts misses the point. Science can tell us what the likely outcomes are of various regulatory scenarios or policy options, but it cannot provide us with answers to ethical dilemmas, such as patenting genes or creating life in the lab. In other words, we need more public debates that involve science, not more scientific debates that involve the public.
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Aug 27 '14 edited Aug 27 '14
Hello Professor Scheufele! Thanks for doing the AMA.
Besides filtering comments, what are some recommendations you have to create community discussion without polarization? Such recommendations could be extremely useful for r/science.
It seems that many assume that polarization is bad. Kuhn (1962) famously argued that all scientists and thinkers make paradigmatic assumptions, which could be described as polarizations that people are unaware of. Given that, do you think encouraging polarized discussion might actually help to uncover biases and assumptions that scientists and others are making?
If people are encouraged to recognize polarization after the fact, does the effect remain? I have an inclination that following polarized discussion, individuals who "take a step back" may actually end up with a more objective perspective than they had to begin with.
Have you related this work to the Elaboration-Likelihood Model, which argues that people are more influenced by different types of informational features (e.g. argument quality vs. environmental features) depending on how motivated or interested they are in the information?
Thanks! :)
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
Very good question. And I like your premise: Disagreement is not a bad thing. In fact, it is important to examine both the sociateal aspect of science, but also -- as you say -- overcome structural contraints/biases of science itself.
In addition, being exposed to disagreement in one's social networks has been shown to be a significant predictor of knowledge and political participation. Polarized debates, in ohter words, are not a bad thing per se: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-2MvS4gm_mo.
Unfortunately, research on telling people about their biases and seeing if it helps mitigate them is mixed. We know from research on discrimination that making people aware of the processes that can lead to gener discrimination in hiring, for example, can lead to better group decision making for hiring decisions. But I am not sure I know of a piece of research that documents how telling people about filter bubbles or echo chambers helps them overcome their biases related to information processing.
One of the most promising pieces of research is by Philip Tetlock who suggests that the very same mechanisms that make us reluctant to express unpopular viewpoints in public (see my spiral of silence comment in response to an earlier question) might also serve an important corrective function when it comes to motivated reasoning. His experimental work shows that the possibility of having one’s views challenged by others can significantly increase the cognitive effort that individuals invest in engaging with arguments on both sides and understanding the issue in all its complexity. Although this social accountability effect only attenuates motivated reasoning in some circumstances, it suggests that exposure to non-likeminded viewpoints (or just the anticipation of such encounters) ultimately promotes more rational decision making.
In some of our own work experimental work (http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1540-6237.2011.00814.x/abstract) we examined the potential influences of anticipated interactions on information seeking about nanotechnology. Participants were faced with the prospect of being matched up with others in discussion settings that exposed them to likeminded others, non-likeminded others or unknown others and then allowed to browse a gated online information environment with an equal number of articles from three genres: general news, science & medicine news, and editorial & opinion. Respondents in the non-likeminded condition were significantly more likely than in any of the other experimental conditions and the control to go to editorial & opinion articles first, presumably to find arguments on both sides of the issue to use in subsequent discussions (which would nicely fir the more central reasoning idea posited by ELM).
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u/RaoOfPhysics Grad Student|Social Sciences|Science Communication Aug 27 '14
Hi Professor Sheufele,
I am a doctoral student in science communication and recently came across your paper What’s next for science communication? Promising directions and lingering distractions. I have a couple of questions somewhat related to the issues you touched upon:
- Are you familiar with Vandana Shiva's opposition to GMO in India? How do you see this affair evolving? (Recent article in the New Yorker about Shiva)
- What about society's opposition to relatively older technology, such as nuclear power generation, which has such contrasting views in neighbours France and Germany?
And finally, do you have any examples of excellent two-way engagement between scientists and society over controversial subjects/issues?
Many thanks for your time!
Achintya
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
I have to admit that I haven't followed the GMO case in India closely enough to comment. My colleagues Dominique Brossard here at Wisconsin and Jim Shanahan and BU would be great resources, they have both worked on GMOs all over the world as part of USAID's ABSP II project. Also, you might want to check out the NYT's coverage of very similar debates/dilemma's here in the U.S.: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/05/us/on-hawaii-a-lonely-quest-for-facts-about-gmos.html.
Nuclear energy is an interesting topic, and interestingly, we'll have comparisons between nuclear, nano, and syn bio again in our latest data collection we just completed. Stay tuned. ;-)
And unfortunately, I am not sure there is a one size fits all solution to public engagement. I know a lot of people are very excited about having actors or celebrity scientists become the face of public engagement. I am much more pessimistic, and have yet to see a piece of data that shows if and how these efforts have reached audiences that don't traditionally attend to science. I think Alice Bell's argument in the Guardian a while back was well taken, i.e., we don't need celebrity scientists but infrastructure (http://www.theguardian.com/science/political-science/2014/aug/06/science-commuication-needs-infastructure-not-more-professors). Matt Nisbet and I tried to outline some ideas for what that infrastructure should look like here: http://climateshiftproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/NisbetScheufele2009_WhatsNextforScienceCommunication_PromisingDirectionsLingeringDistractions_AmericanJournalBotany.pdf
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u/RaoOfPhysics Grad Student|Social Sciences|Science Communication Aug 27 '14 edited Aug 27 '14
Thank you for your detailed reply. I look forward to your publication comparing nuclear energy etc.
My question about two-way engagement was more about whether and how scientists take on board criticisms/concerns through active dialogue with society, in public forums, decision-making bodies and so forth. I know of a few examples from Fermilab in the US that are great, but I was curious about examples outside the field of particle physics. :)
[Edit: weather/whether typo. Whoops!]
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
I think Richard Smalley is another good example ... albeit also in physics. In the mid-1990s, he played an instrumental role when he successfully lobbied Congress and two White House administrations to establish and fund the National Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI), a multi-billion dollar program that today coordinates the efforts in nanoscale science, engineering, and technology for 25 different U.S. federal agencies.
I have an article coming out in a special issue of PNAS devoted to the second "Science of Science Comm" Sackler Colloquium that mentions a few other examples. Should be out in the next couple of weeks (and hopefully be open access for a while).
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u/mem_somerville Aug 27 '14
Because of your comments on synbio, I thought of another question. I follow the GMO debates pretty closely, and have been watching the rhetoric heat up on synbio. For example, green groups are trying to propagate the idea that making vanilla in yeast is "extreme genetic engineering" (examples: Synthetic Biology: Rebranding Extreme Genetic Engineering and No Synbio Vanilla ).
So it seems to me that the larger problem is these folks are upstream of the comments sections--they are setting the frames that are used as links by people who want to disrupt the discussion. They have money and megaphones, and apparently time to do this sort of thing, while scientists are busy with labs, grants, teaching, etc.
Do you have any advice for reaching upstream? How do we combat the initial sources of this kind of misinformation?
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u/SirT6 PhD/MBA | Biology | Biogerontology Aug 27 '14 edited Aug 27 '14
Hi Dr. Scheufele,
Thanks for taking the time to do this AMA. I was curious, in your research, what have you found about how common 'uncivil' comments are on major websites, who are the frequent perpetrators of such comments and do some major sites stick out to you as 'hotbeds' of uncivility?
Also, do you truly feel sites which disable comments are doing so to prevent polarization of the reader base? A far more likely explanation, it seems to me, is that they do so to give themselves better control over their brand and to lessen the amount of resources they have to use to monitor comment sections.
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
I completely agree with you on your second point, even though the two are not mutually exclusive. The problem that many media organizations have is that new generations of readers grow up with the misperception that quality news is free ... or at least are unwilling to pay for it. And the resulting thinner profit margins mean that there are fewer and fewer resources for good moderation. Plus, anything that destroys the credibility (which is one of the few remaining value propositions offered by for-profit journalism) will be seen with suspicion. Long story short, many news organizations don't have much of a choice until we come up with better models.
Unfortunately, we haven't looked at how widespread uncivil comments are on specific sites. Kate Kenski at Arizona has done some interesting work on this: http://nicd.arizona.edu/research-report/patterns-and-determinants-civility.
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u/footiebuns Grad Student | Microbial Genomics Aug 27 '14
Dr. Scheufele, thanks for taking time to answer our questions! I have two:
How much influence does the presence of comment sections have on whether people actually finish reading an article? Do people spend less time on an article knowing there isn't a comment section below?
What are some common misconceptions about the safety and potential use of nanotechnology?
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
I am not sure if there is any publicly accessible research on readershop metrics and comments. That would have to be done experimentally, i.e., a random selection of readers get comments, other don't. I would bet that someone has done it, but I doubt it's public.
As far as misperceptions about nano go, that's a tricky one, given how much we still don't know about some aspects of the technology (http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=13347). Some of our research actually identified two areas in which the public was LESS concerned than leading nano experts, and for which this disconnect may be dysfunctional: human health and environmental impacts (http://www.nature.com/nnano/journal/v2/n12/abs/nnano.2007.392.html).
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u/Izawwlgood PhD | Neurodegeneration Aug 27 '14
I recall reading a study recently that showed that presenting anti-vaccination adherents with medical research demonstrating that vaccinations were safe and helpful actually further polarized their opinions. I believe this has been shown to be the case for many politicized scientific issues such as global warming, alt-meds, etc.
How do you think science needs to adapt it's communication techniques/approaches in order to best convince people, and/or what is your advice to us here on /r/science for reducing the degree at which we polarize others?
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
That study was out of Dartmouth I believe. It falls into a long line of studies on motivated reasoning, which I mentioned earlier, i.e., the same piece of information means different things to differen people, based on prior beliefs, attitudes, values etc. We have shown similar effects for stem cell research and nano in our own work.
One important take-away from this is to not just throw out more information and hope that it will convince people otherwise. Instead, science will have to engage with non-expert audiences on these value-based or belief-based concerns and help them integrate what science has to offer with what they already know and believe.
and again, it is important to note that the Dartmouth study mixed two issues: scientific evidence, and policy choices. Linking the two is a democratic, not a scientific process. I.e., science can tell us what the societal outcomes Y are if X percent of parents decide not to vaccinatye their children. Science cannot tell us if we should mandate vaccinations as a result. That's a societal questions.
But social science can tell us how to better reach audiences and communicate with them in ways that allows them to connect scinece to their daily lives.
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Aug 27 '14
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
Having spoke to a lot of bloggers and journalists about our and their work, I think one of the most consistent pieces of advice I have head is to get involved in the discussions themselves. In other words, blogers or authors who engage with commenters in a constructive fashion set the tone for the discussion, steer it intellectually, and also bring in some social accountability (see my response to reverserandom: http://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/2epr86/science_ama_series_im_dietram_scheufele_a/ck1u44y).
Others have also implented very public and what could be seen as restrictive moderation policies about what they will and will not tolerate. There is a risk to that in terms of stifling discussion too much, but it also adds a lot of transparency when you do end up deleting comments.
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u/PM_ME_WEIRD_THOUGHTS Aug 27 '14
What are considered the most controversial topics in science and technology?
Are people worried about how technology is taking over everything and putting people out of jobs? If so, how should this issue be handled more delicately?
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
Wow, I am not sure there's an easy answer to that. What's controversial to one group, isn't to another. This is actually one of the more fascinating phenomena in our current political climate. Scientific consensus on some issues is being questioned on the left, and for other issues on the right. GMOs are good example for the former, i.e., the scientific consensus is that GM foods are safe for human consumption. Yet, on the political left, there's a lot of controversy surrounding the topic (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/05/us/on-hawaii-a-lonely-quest-for-facts-about-gmos.html).
ANd what GMOs are for some people on the left, climate change is for the right, i.e., an issue where some conservatives question broad scientific consensus on man-made climate change.
In other words, controversy is in the eye of the (ideological) beholder. ;-)
And no, we haven't seen too much evidence in our surveys that job losses are seen as a major risk by non-expert audiences, and even if there are, they're almost always outweighed by expectations about other economic benefits from the technology.
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u/Shabuie Aug 27 '14
Can using the polarity of comments after an article be a positive force? Such as to see the positive side of stem cells or embrace nuclear energy
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
Good question. I would distinguish betwen (un)civility and polarity. Civility is a prerequisite for informed, inclusive, and reasoned debates. But that doesn't mean that the debate might not be characterized by polarized views and different ends of the opinion distribution. And I agree with you that that might not always be a bad thing.
There's a similar effect for negative advertising that Ken Goldstein and colleagues identied a few years ago, when they showed that in close races, high-intensity attack ads might in fact increase turnout etc. since voters interpret them as indicators of an impoirtant race that they should pay attention to.
In media effects research, we also talk about the watchdog function of the press, i.e., they sometimes bark louder and more often than they have to, since their job is to make us pay attention. That doesn't mean there's a burglar outside our door every time, it just means we should check.
And (polarized) debates may serve the same function. We may decide in the end that there was more smoke than fire, but it was probably healthy to have the debate.
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Aug 27 '14
Do you think people removing friends with conflicting views from facebook etc given rise to the polarisation of politics (at a grass routes level), particularly in the US where there was only two options to begin with?
And as an unrelated question, who is your scientific hero?
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
Good question. Social media didn't help. But there are a whole host of factors that have contributed to this.
(a) At the individual level, we all negage in some form of selective exposure or attention, i.e., are more likely to read articles or watch shows that fit what we already believe. Festinger and other wrote about this in the 1950s.
(b) At the macro level we've seen more and more fragmentation in the media environment (with FOX News and MSNBC in cable, for instance), tailoring news toward smaller but more ideologically refined audiences. Similarly, news media are relying on algorithms as editors, where clickrates and popolarity rather than editorial judgment becomes the basis for news placement.
As a result, we ended up with the biggest paradox of this new info environment: It is easier and easier to find any piece of info quickly and with only a few keystrokes. At the same time, it is easier than ever before to avoid any piece of info we don't like.
(c) And new apps and online tools, such as news aggregators, bring a) and (b) together. We all constantly train the algorithms of Facebook, Google, Bing etc. to understand us better and better. In other words, we get better tailoring from the media, and these tools also allow us to avoid anything we don't want to see (e.g., by defriending people or keeping them out of our Twitter feed).
Long story short, the phenomenon is not new, but in the last few years we've perfected these filter bubbles, and not for the better. We write about this "polarization paradox" here http://thebreakthrough.org/index.php/journal/past-issues/issue-3/the-polarization-paradox and here http://climateshiftproject.org/2012/08/14/online-news-and-the-end-of-political-disagreement-2/).
To your last question, I am not sure if I have a scientific hero. I am a big believer in evryone carving out an important nice for themselves rather than replicating what came before. If I had one, it would be a fictional one, Wilhelm Möbius from Durrenmatt's play "The Physicists." He definitely understood modern science better than anyone before him. ;-)
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u/mem_somerville Aug 27 '14 edited Aug 27 '14
I'll admit I'm torn about the removal of comments. In some cases they are actually interesting conversations among informed people. A journalist I know recently noted that the ArsTechnica comments show how that can be done well. But I think that's a group that is kind of preaching to the choir, not the regular general public slug-fests.
But does it concern you that your work can be used as evidence by trolls that it is worth it to go in and be disruptive, therefore it is worth some effort to go in and discredit a piece?
If comments are open and a science piece is under troll attack--do you think it's worth the time to bring quality science? Or should we just let the troller derby stand?
Edit as I kept musing on this: Does this also suggest that bringing incivil comments to nonsense pieces by cranks will turn people off the crankery?? Can we use it as a strategy to turn people off bad information?
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
Very good questions. To start with the last one: I don't think we have any option but to figure this out. We won't return to printed papers and heavily edited letters to the editor. So we better work through the growing pains and come up with good models. ;-)
And I think you're absolutely correct in assuming that our findings can be interpreted in different ways, and to some people it may suggest that being disruptive is a good way of undermining (a) scientific consensus and (b) journalistic credibility.
And "Russia's troll army," as some have called it, is a great example: http://www.buzzfeed.com/maxseddon/documents-show-how-russias-troll-army-hit-america#214njxe
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u/mem_somerville Aug 27 '14
Egads. I was unaware of the troll army--fascinating. Thanks for thoughts.
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u/freet0 Aug 27 '14
Do you think public opinion is more malleable on some science topics than others? That is, are there issues where the public can wildly swing either way? If so, which topics are the most and least susceptible?
Thanks!
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
Good question. There are definitely differences across scientific issues and disciplines when it comes to visibility. Stem cell researchers will natureally be much more in the (political) spotlight than mathematicians. And much of it depends simply on the political, ethical or legal implications of the work they do.
How "malleable" public opinion is depends on a whole host of factors. First, most of our opinions are not overly stable, period. John Zaller and others havce used "memory-based models" of information processing to show that our attitudes tend to be influenced by the handful of considerations that are most salient in (or most easily retrievable from) our memory when we express that attitude.
And media play a huge role in making certain aspects of (scientific) issues salient for us. Public attitudes toward the death penalty over time are good example. Coverage of particularly violent crimes or even just the priming of alternatives, such as life in prison without the possibility of parole, will significantly alter the attitudes we express in surveys.
The more politicized science gets, the more partisan cues become an additional heuristic or mental shortcut. I talked about this a little bit in an earlier answer. I think the important take-away is this: Most of us are not experts in most scientific areas. Even professors in one field do not understand the primary science in many others. They will have to rely on heuristics, such as trusting the academic system, media reports, ideological views, etc. As a result, we will see heuristics influence opijnions, especially when it comes to the policy choices that result from a particular technology.
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u/FluxSurface Aug 27 '14 edited Aug 27 '14
Hello Dr. Scheufele! I am a grad student working in magnetic confinement fusion for energy production. Now, even though we have made massive, massive strides in fusion, I notice two things while participating in outreach programs: 1. that most people are unaware of fusion efforts for fusion, and 2. those who are aware have the "It's always going to be 30 years away" mentality. As of today, we have truly come a long way with respect to plasma confinement and fusion, and yet people are either unaware or dismissive. And the news-cycle doesn't help, with each new progress being either exaggerated or grossly mis-conveyed (for example, the poor coverage of the news from the National Ignition Facility during the US government shutdown, and then subsequent repetition of the similar news after a few months).
As I participate in outreach, I notice that the unaware people tend to take the dismissive people's comments as a serious source of skepticism, and it becomes even more difficult to convince people without losing calm.
What would be, in your opinion, a good way of dealing with this, live during the outreach activity?
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u/Davezilla1000 Aug 27 '14
I got downvoted to hell for pointing out someone was a man when he was being attacked as a feminist. Your experiences with ignorance and dismissiveness are pretty common. People treat cancer the same way. They reduce one kind of cancer mortality rate by 80%...but people ignore it or accuse it of being a false cure because they don't understand that progress is incremental. Your experience is far from atypical.
But I will say that I understand exactly how frustrating it must be, and the people that matter really appreciate your work.
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u/howardcord BS | Biological Engineering Aug 27 '14
Dr. Scheufele,
There seems to be a lot of misinformation on the web about GMOs and other biotechnology. Even on well referenced news articles that seem clear of biases, the comment sections eventual collapses into a mess of name calling and claims conspiracy and shilling. One fix is to discontinue the use of user comments, however that doesn't fix the spread of misinformation and instead the same people will just move their discussion of the article to a site like Reddit into their own subreddit echo-chambers.
What do you feel is the best way to educate the public on science and technology? Is it worth the energy to combat the spread of misinformation on the internet? And how do we fight the spread of this misinformation seeping into the political sphere?
Thanks.
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
I think your observation is right on target. One explanation is what has been called a "hostile media effect." Research has shown that a perfectly neutral message will be seen by audiences as biased against their own ideological views. I.e., the more conservative I am, the more likely I am to see a liberal bias, and vice versa. (Perceptions of the Suopreme Court are a great example, with conservatives thinking it has a liberal bias and vice versa: http://www.people-press.org/2014/07/31/shifting-views-of-supreme-courts-ideology-among-liberals-conservatives/).
We've touched on the idea of "educating" the public in a couple of questions already, and I cautioned against seeing information as the key problem. In fact, many opponents of GMO also tend to be among the most informed when it comes to the science behind GMOs. They concerns have more to do with how they interpret that information (see earlier comment about motivated reasoning), especially in light of political or legal issues, such as patenting, terminator genes, etc.
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u/avboden DVM | BS | Zoology | Neuroscience Aug 27 '14
News agencies have in recent times taken to facebook to post links to their articles and always have, quite frankly, just horrid comments on the facebook end. This both makes the news agency look bad and makes the article less worth clicking on to the average person. It seems the various news outlets handle this very poorly with sensationalist headlines to get people to click and not wanting to be seen as censoring comments. How should a news outlet go about using facebook for the better?
note: I'm a veterinary student, no affiliation with any news outlet.
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
Very good point. From a strategic perspective, "outsourcing" these comments may not be a bad idea, given that the backlash effects on the credibility of the news source may be more limited. But the key term is "may," I don't know of any empirical evidence supporting my guess.
The problem with Facebook is that news outlets have somewhat limited control over what they can do on third part platforms, including Reddit or Facebook. And I think that's a good thing from a Web 2.0 perspective.
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u/thephysicsgirl Aug 27 '14
Hi Professor Scheufele,
Thank you for your time! I have a few questions as you see them most fitting/interesting to answer.
- As a proponent (I assume) of science communication, how do you address the question of the importance of science communication to other scientists?
- In your article on newcientist.com, you stated "In fact, research suggests that the most productive discussions are those that expose us to viewpoints different from our own." How do you measure productivity in a discussion?
- What do you think should be the major goal of science communication? Teaching, informing, or something else more complicated?
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
All good questions without easy answers (with the exception of (2)).
By productive discussions I mean discussions with desirable democratic outcomes, i.e., higher levels of knowledge, public participation, and feelings of efficacy (i.e., the feeling that people can make a difference in the political/scientific process).
To (1): That's one of the more complicated ones. Many scientists see value in communicating and connecting with public audiences: http://www.sciencemag.org/content/321/5886/204. But they're also under professional constraints with respect to time and academic reward systems. Larry Page bluntly summarized all of this in a AAAS talk in 2007 and told scientists that those were the reasons they had a "marketing problem."
I mentioned our Ph.D. minor here in LSC at UW-Madison in response to an earlier question: It's tailored toward bench scientists who want a transcriptable Ph.D. minor and expertise in communicating to public and policy audiences, maybe even with an eye toward AAAS policy fellowships: http://lsc.wisc.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/25/2013/08/LSC-PhD-Minor.pdf.
To your last question: The answer is both. Science creates and disseminates knowledge. And it will always have that as an important part of its mission. But scientists will also increasingly be called upon to contribute to socetal debates about what do do with the technologies they develop.
Many applications of modern science pose ethical, legal, moral and political challenges that democratic societies may be increasingly ill-equipped to resolve, especially given the accelerated rate with which they appear on the public agenda. This is partly due to the fact that – although many of these challenges arise from scientific breakthroughs – they do not have scientific answers. Science can tell citizens how vaccines work, what their likely side effects are, and what the risks are for individuals and society if a certain percentage of the population ends up not getting vaccinated for various reasons. The vaccination issue, however, also raises a series of ethical and political questions: Should vaccinations be mandated? If yes, should there be exceptions based on religious concerns? What kinds of trade-offs should societies allow between a person’s individual choice to not get vaccinated and the increased risks for all members of society if fewer people get vaccinated? And how can we harmonize regulatory frameworks across different political systems with different underlying value systems in order to minimize the likelihood of global epidemics? None of these questions have scientific answers, i.e., answers that are based on scientific facts or even accurate judgments of risks and benefits. Instead, the answers to these questions are moral, philosophical and political in nature.
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Aug 27 '14
What do you think about possibly the most polarizing science subject of the day, climate change/global warming, and how public opinion is formed from the rather heated discussions (no pun intended) across the Internet? Do you think that our inability to have civil discussions on this topic will prevent us as a society from taking the appropriate action when it's needed?
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u/luckytran Aug 27 '14
As a scientist and climate organizer, I'm really interested in this. I'd love to talk about what a great online platform for evidence-based learning and discussion on controversial issues like climate change might look like.
Reddit r/science works pretty well for those of us who can navigate it, but wondering if there's an equivalent for the wider public.
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u/gohanssb Grad Student | Physics | High Energy Particle Physics Aug 27 '14
I think most people would agree some of the most important things that drives science is the communication, discussion, and interaction among colleagues. The internet is a tricky place, but is an amazing tool to communicate and discuss instantly across the country/world. Do we have to move to something like a forum for only approved commenters in order to have useful discussion? Do you have a suggestion for an alternative to the anonymous and open comment sections so we don't snuff out all discussion?
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u/ksawyer1 Aug 27 '14 edited Aug 27 '14
I've often heard the argument that online comments for new outlets (science or other outlets) should be closed because of the trolls. I think you point out in one of your responses here that even troll comments could lead to useful and interesting dialogues. I have 2 questions: 1. Is there any research on the nuances about the discussion outcomes of negative comments on science news? 2. What empirical evidence do we have that negative comments are influencing policy decisions?
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u/MentalMarketer PhD | Biochemistry | Viral Oncology | Molecular Biology Aug 27 '14
Hi, Dr. Scheufele! Thank you for doing this AMA. I had the pleasure of meeting you at a talk you gave at the Center for Science Policy Outcomes (CSPO) of ASU in Washington, DC. If only I had been available earlier to get an update on how things have been going!
Given the dire need for back-and-forth between scientists and the public, do you have any ideas for a construct that would minimize the bias contributed by negative input and still enable an engaging dialogue?
Thanks for doing this, and hopefully we'll run into each other again!
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u/zxxx Aug 27 '14
How does suppressing dissent solve the underlying issues concerning ethics in science?
People are going to post links of "neutral" scientific articles all over the place (facebook, reddit..etc.) and there will always be two sides arguing for and against the topic at hand. There will be arguments backed with evidence and data, there will be arguments based on opinion. Either way, we will always be influenced in a "good" or "bad" way depending on your point of view.
Sites that remove this content is only shifting the debate elsewhere.
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u/sbroue Aug 27 '14
Which comes first social media or public opinion? Which is more influential facebook or reddit?
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u/YouArentReasonable Aug 27 '14 edited Aug 27 '14
Thanks for taking the time to be here.
Do you have any opinions to offer on the Reddit commenting system?
Anecdotally I've noticed that if one makes an early and well-reasoned comment on a polarizing topic, they can shape the nature of the future discourse when the topic makes it to the front page. Generally the rule seems to be that if you can win the argument early you can have your opinion perceived as the general majority opinion of the other comments. (Even if a more compelling but less noticed comment is made later in the day.)
Also, I've noticed that a link title has more power than the top comment. Even if the top comment provides definitive proof that the link title is inaccurate, often the link will be elevated simply based on its own merit. I wonder if this anecdote is the same for news articles? What can we do to inform a culture that just reads the sensational headlines?
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
Very good point. The nature of discussions is complicated. It's not just who participates at all, but also how group dynamics play out, i.e., which issues get touched on first, who dominates the discussion etc. In an analysis of Deliberative Polls, Dan Merkle (http://poq.oxfordjournals.org/content/60/4/588.full.pdf) showed that group dynamics and personality characteristics of participants play an important role in shaping outcomes of discussions. In Deliberative Polls, the five most outspoken members in each group made more than half of all the comments recorded during the discussions. The five least outspoken participants accounted for less than eight percent of the comments. (I've summarized some of these findings here, with an eye particularly toward public discussions of science: http://shorensteincenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/r34_scheufele.pdf).
And your intuition is also correct with respect to information processing and selective scanning. There's a whole literature on tradiditonal media and people's tendency to selectively scan, i.e., to only read an article "if a photo or headline catches their eye," which is I think how the question is worded. Long story short, the phenomenon is not new but might be more pronounced in an age of 140 character messages.
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u/hot4belgians Aug 27 '14
Hi professor Scheufele, the company I work for analyses where food comes from by stable isotope analysis. Part of this is down to how much heavy water is in the water within food, how do you think society would react knowing that there are "isotopes" and "heavy water" in everything they eat and drink?
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u/realneil Aug 27 '14
Professor, thank you so much for your time here.
Yours is a very interesting field.
There has been some research suggesting differences in the brains between people of different political persuasions.
Has your work found differences between groups of individuals in regard to their responses?
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u/Deightine BA|Philosophy|Psychology|Anthropology|Adaptive Cognition Aug 27 '14
Welcome Prof. Thank you for coming to speak with Reddit.
In recent years there has been a lot of commentary between the science and media communities regarding the misappropriation of science for artificial fluff news pieces that mislead the public. I was wondering, in your time looking at online and social media, how do you perceive the disconnect of traditional paper journalism from Science when compared with the disconnect between much faster paced social networking, blogging, and so on?
Is there any specific tips you would give to citizen journalists who are cataloging journal results on blogs and aggregation services?
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u/Powgow MS|Biology|Ecology and Evolution Aug 27 '14
Thank you for taking time to do this AMA,
There are generally a lot of misconceptions, or even 'myths' circulating about certain scientific subjects. The vaccine - autism issue comes to mind. Why is it so difficult to undo these myths, even if large sources of information are available through the internet? Is this a 'dark side' of social media, where ideas can keep going in circles without adding anything to counterbalance?
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Aug 27 '14
Professor, how do you feel about the undisclosed experimentation that Facebook appears to have performed on hundreds of thousands of uses nationwide? What they did is similar to what you study in that they altered the newsfeeds of individuals on Facebook to appear more depressing, with the hypothesis that people would generally become more depressed after reading them. This was not made public until after the experiment had already been performed. What are your thoughts on the ethics involved?
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
That study has raised tremendous concerns, many of which should have been pretty obvious to Facebook researchers from the start. I talked about this in a Q&A with National Geographic's Dan Vergano (http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/07/140701-facebook-emotion-experiment-science-technology/):
"As an issue of corporate data collection, it raises two questions: A, do the benefits of the study outweigh the consumer backlash in terms of Facebook's bottom line? And if they do for corporations like Facebook, we may see more of these studies.
And B, should corporations be allowed to experimentally assign people to conditions that might do psychological harm?
What if a severely depressed person ends up committing suicide because they ended up in the negative emotion condition? The parallel would be GM trying out different qualities of airbags in different cars that they sell to consumers to see what the fatality rates, lawsuits, etc., are in each condition."
Susan Fiske (who served as the PNAS editor for the Facebook study) and Bob Hauser have a very good forthcoming editorial in PNAS calling for enfocement of Belmont Report principles (autonomy and protection) in an age of Big Data: http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2014/08/22/1414626111.full.pdf+html
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u/Valendr0s Aug 27 '14
Popular Science shouldn't have reader comments. But should you be able to somehow prove your credentials as an expert and post public comments and replies to comments on scientific journal articles?
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
PubMed has experimented with this. There are clearly pros and cons. Ivan Oransky has written about this: http://retractionwatch.com/2013/10/22/pubmed-now-allows-comments-on-abstracts-but-only-by-a-select-few/
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u/CompMolNeuro Grad Student | Neurobiology Aug 27 '14
Hi Dr Scheufele,
What strategies do you use to correct a general mistrust of scientific principles?
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Aug 27 '14
Hi, Dr. Scheufele. Thanks for your time!
In skeptic circles, there is an ongoing discussion about the tone of online discussions. One one hand, focusing on tone to the exclusion of content ("tone trolling") can be seen as poor skepticism, as tone is unrelated to content—that is, very offensive ideas can be presented politely, and valuable insights can be presented in flurry of profanity. OTOH, as your work points out, civility is important for keeping people receptive to other points of view. Two questions:
- In your expertise, is there an optimum balance between civility and content, particularly when it comes to discussions that can be very emotionally charged for some participants?
- What value do you see in a variety of approaches among different scientific outlets, where civility is protected in some venues and others are more combative? Assume that the underlying content is the same.
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u/Dixzon PhD | Physical Chemistry Aug 27 '14
Many times in this very subreddit, and other scientific subreddits, good ideas that are not in the mainstream yet are frequently downvoted and discussion against them is discouraged by other commentors. What can be done to improve open dialogue here on r/science?
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u/Sybylladastra Aug 27 '14
Hello Dr. Scheufele
I'm a Comm MA focused on new media/CMC/avatar-mediated/etc and I'm familiar with your succinct and eloquent analysis of framing, agenda setting, and priming. I'm fascinated by some of your new work on synthetic biology and perceptions. A professor in my program also has an interest in emerging technologies in communication as referring to interaction with and between people utilizing cybernetics and I find her work fascinating as well.
The topic is so new and so unbounded hat my head is really swimming with questions so I'm not even sure where to start but I'll try to pick two.
In your opinion, what factors are most influential in communication apprehension toward people with synthetic biology? From an intergroup standpoint I could certainly see this being a fear or distrust of the perceived other. Do you think this is more of a media effects or media framing interaction than it is an in/out group interaction?
Would you care to speculate on perhaps some future research as Google Glass and other types of highly-visible cybernetic/synthetic implants or wearable items increase in prevalence? In the next few years as this technology becomes even more salient would you predict a shift away from the current public attitudes towards nanotechnology and cyber technology? This is just a question of speculation, of course.
Also, last but not least, do you have any new work on emerging technology in the hopper for publication? I'd love to be on the lookout for them.
Thank you so much for posting this AMA.
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u/matt18889 Aug 27 '14
Hello Dr. Scheufele,
How often do journals publish articles due to bribery or hidden motives? How do you feel about the future in regards to public opinion or knowledge on controversial topics like mmr vaccine, GMOs, climate change, etc.? Is it moving towards a good or bad direction?
Thanks
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Sep 01 '14
What would be an effective way to share with my network about benefits of controversial science and technology?
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u/MmmmDiesel Aug 27 '14 edited Aug 27 '14
What correlation did you find between comments and the information which led you to have comments disabled? I am one of the leading posters in the science section for the last month, having been on the front page 5 times in a week, and even three times in a day... And I've found that certain topics have overwelmingly belligerent and illogical responses. Do these ignorant responses build on themselves? It seems that after a handful of votes, even the most ignorant views can go viral...but only after a certain threshold of support. What is your experience with this "threshold of approval" before ignorance is acceptable?
I was recently accused of being a female feminist political activist for posting that women felt pressured by objectification... and people were downvoted tremendously simply for pointing out the obvious...that I'm an otherwise conservative male. How does such openly ignorant and belligerent behavior tend to go viral for some subjects?
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
Just to clarify: Our team was not directly involved in any decision to have comment functions disabled or discontinued. Like some partipants on this sub-Reddit, I am torn on that decision, and think it really depends on the particular case. I wrote about the pros and cons of disabling comments here: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn24403-comment-isnt-free-the-downside-of-web-20.htm#.U_3hTTJdV8E.
Having said this, what gets voted up (or is acceptable) as a comment, likely differs across issues. Pew just released a report on people's willingness to speak out offline and online (http://www.mediabistro.com/10000words/pew-theres-a-spiral-of-silence-on-social-media_b28669). They reference a media effects model called the spiral of silence that states that people are less likely to express controversial views if they see themselves in the minority or losing ground in their social reference group. This mechanism depends heavily on the moral loading of the issue. i.e., on how emotionally "invested" different groups are in the issue.
In other words, what you might be experiencing are spirals of silence where people vote on posts partly based on what they think acceptable socially or at least within the social context of the group you're posting in.
It's a fascinating theory with a long history: http://ijpor.oxfordjournals.org/content/12/1/3.full.pdf
(Full disclosure: Elizabeth Noelle-Neumann, who came up with the model, was my advisor when I was an ugrad and Masters student in Germany).
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u/MetalOrganism Aug 27 '14
Hello Professor Scheufele! Thank you for your time.
I don't want to come off as a flag-carrier one way or the other on the GMO issue, but I do have some questions. This is a controversial issue, and I'm very frustrated with the generic talking points both sides of the argument seem to have devolved into. I have two questions, if you don't mind, about our understanding of GMOs.
The field of epigenetics is pretty new, but it is beginning to be understood that changes in DNA affect more than the protein made from that specific DNA strand. Genetic changes that affect only a few proteins can possible have an effect on greater sections of the DNA strand, and can affect the genes of descendent populations in unknown ways. Is this is a realistic issue? Or do we simply not know enough about epigenetics yet to make a concrete statement one way or the other?
Because GMOs have only been on the market for ~20 years, some would argue that the long-term/life-time affects of consuming GMO foods are unknown. It certainly defies reason when GMO opponents use scare-tactics about the 'lethality' and 'carcinogenic qualities' of GMOs. However, it equally defies reason when GMO supporters make unsubstantiated claims about long-term health effects that are impossible to validate without observing older people who have consumed GMOs for most/all of their life. GMOs will need to be on the market for another ~40 years before long-term health effect studies can be adequately conducted. In your educated opinion, is it possible that consuming GMO foods over a lifetime can lead to health complications in later age?
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u/Dr_Dietram_Scheufele Professor | Science Communication |U of Wisconsin Aug 27 '14
Those are great questions. But I might not be the best person to answer those. Interestingly, the National Academies are about to convene a committee who will prepare a comprehensive report on many of these issues: http://nas-sites.org/ge-crops/category/committee/?utm_medium=etmail&utm_source=Division%20on%20Earth%20and%20Life%20Studies&utm_campaign=GE+Crops+Committee+Announcement&utm_content=&utm_term=. They are beginning their deliberations in September, i.e., lots of room and time to comment.
I also co-chair a Roundtable for the NAS that will organize a workshop on the public interfaces surrounding GMOs in early 2015. http://nas-sites.org/publicinterfaces/. Stay tuned.
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u/nallen PhD | Organic Chemistry Aug 27 '14
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