A Missed Opportunity to Address Americans’ Declining Trust in Scientific Research
I was excited to see an editorial in Science Magazine titled “Earning respect and trust." I hoped it would address scientists’ and science communicators’ recent failure to earn the public’s trust, such as:
sounding more like demagogues than skeptical scientists drawing conclusions based on statistical probability;
arguing against the conclusion of a Cochrane meta analysis— the best source of evidence we have—about masks;
keeping kids out of school a long time based on insufficient evidence, while declining to discuss the negative developmental effects;
the handling of the opioid crisis.
In short, many scientists and science communicators are utterly failing to live up to the values of our professions. Could this editorial at last be a warning, or even a mea culpa?
No. The editorial claims the problem is the "elitism” shown by lab scientists who don't want PhD students getting jobs outside academia or value the work of science communicators (such as the good people at Science).
It's as if science were on fire, and the author was complaining about the smell. Obnoxious, yes, but insignificant compared with the real source of the damage.
The editorial is also as myopic as the lab scientists it criticizes. It differs only in centering science journal creators rather than lab scientists. The author writes:
"far too often, I see my colleagues at the journals treated disrespectfully by authors, reviewers, and readers who consider running a research lab as somehow more meaningful than anything else in science… If anything, the challenges that science is experiencing now are … due to a lack of emphasis on other aspects of science—great teaching; communicating; policy-making; and performing the hard intellectual labor of choosing, from the mass of research, those discoveries that deserve publication in a top journal—and then working with authors to make the findings publishable. The notion that lab work is the only purposeful endeavor in science is … an example of precisely what leads to the view that scientists are intellectual elites who do not value the contributions or abilities of anyone except themselves and the small group they deign to recognize as their peers.”
The stirring conclusion:
“The way to restore trust in science and higher education is by earning it. Let’s start by recognizing everyone within the scientific community as peers in the scientific quest.”
While I believe everyone should be treated with respect, and good science communication is necessary for science to flourish, this recommendation won't affect public trust in science. I doubt the public knows, or cares, how elitist scientists treat people working at academic journals.
Worst of all, nowhere does the editorial consider that science communicators could be part of the problem.
Yet, effective, transparent science communicators would leave out researchers’ elitism and hyperbolic claims while explaining what scientists are contributing.
Instead, journalists, university PR people, and others create ever more sensationalized headlines.
Apparently (according to a 2023 Pew poll), only 57% of Americans believe science has had a positive impact on society. Yet, in the past century, science has:
rid the United States of polio, smallpox, and other diseases;
sequenced the genomes of multiple species;
developed new drugs, devices, and medical procedures that save lives;
invented new materials (nylon, microfiber, etc);
produced increasingly energy efficient technology; and more.
You might wonder, “how can people be so oblivious?" Yet, why should people believe science contributes to their lives when they're constantly surrounded by clearly hyperbolic headlines about the overblown benefits of some new science or medical discovery? Or when, as in health news, they're often told the opposite just as hyperbolically a few years later?
Journalists create further confusion by using every possible opportunity to tie science into topics that are more familiar, controversial, and likely to draw eyeballs: politics.
Sometimes, this insistence on framing every science story around politics has benefits. The increasingly widespread focus on social inequity does draw attention to real social issues affecting science.
However, framing every story around familiar political narratives draws attention to what people already know and believe (or don't) about how society works – and away from what they don't know: how science works.
And, of course, these narratives “politicize” science – a state that science communicators ironically bemoan.
In short: the fields of science and science communication need genuine self examination, but this editorial isn't it. I'm left disappointed.
…
Endnote: I deliberately do not name the author here, and respond only to the content of the editorial itself. I want to reply to the ideas presented, not criticize a person.
This post is also an experiment in blurring the lines between blogging and Substack Notes: writing shorter, less time intensive pieces, with more personality and opinion. In fact, it started as a Substack note. Would you like to see this style experiment repeated?