--- title: Trust in scientists tags: live-v0.1, communication, trust permalink: https://c19vax.scibeh.org/pages/trust_scientists --- {%hackmd 5iAEFZ5HRMGXP0SGHjFm-g %} <!---{%hackmd FnZFg00yRhuCcufU_HBc1w %}---> {%hackmd GHtBRFZdTV-X1g8ex-NMQg %} # Trust in scientists ## The contextual and ephemeral nature of trust Trust in scientists has in general increased during the pandemic in several countries, despite claims and concerns about decreasing trust. For example, according to a survey administered via [the Corona Spezial Science Barometer](https://www.wissenschaft-im-dialog.de/projekte/wissenschaftsbarometer/wissenschaftsbarometer-corona-spezial/]), the share of Germans who completely trust scientists doubled between 2019 and November mid-2020, reaching 70% of the German public. Similarly, in the United Kingdom, [the Open Knowledge Foundation found that 64% of poll respondents](https://blog.okfn.org/2020/05/05/brits-demand-openness-from-government-in-tackling-coronavirus/) were more likely to listen to expert advice from qualified scientists and researchers. However, in the United States, trust in scientists and medical experts has only risen among Democrats according to a [Pew Research opinion poll conducted in May 2020](https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2020/05/21/trust-in-medical-scientists-has-grown-in-u-s-but-mainly-among-democrats). ![](https://i.imgur.com/r8UFQiV.png) An article posted on Johns Hopkins University's Bloomsberg School of Public Health Experts Insights page reported a similar finding. The article, titled "[Trust in Science and COVID-19](https://www.jhsph.edu/covid-19/articles/trust-in-science-and-covid-19.html)," discusses findings from an [April 2020 national survey](https://snfagora.jhu.edu/project/the-johns-hopkins-covid-19-civic-life-and-public-health-survey/), where 89% of Democrats viewed social distancing as very important, relative to 72% of Independents and 66% of Republicans. Relatedly, Americans' willingness to get a COVID-19 vaccine varies significantly by underlying partisan and ideological positioning according to [Newport's (2020, December) recent article on Gallup's website](https://news.gallup.com/opinion/polling-matters/328034/partisanship-vaccine-uptake-strategies.aspx). **Our [dedicated page](https://c19vax.scibeh.org/pages/publicattitudes) provides more information about people's attitudes to the COVID-19 vaccines.** People's race and ethinicty may also factor into their degree of vaccination trust. For example, Dr. Kali Cyrus, M.D., a psychiatrist in Washington DC, [released a video on Twitter](https://twitter.com/kdc_md/status/1339938540893974532?s=20) that identified tensions in putting her nervousness as a Black person aside to “trust science.” The Harvard Data Science Initiative's Trust in Science Project conducted [a webinar in December 2020](https://datascience.harvard.edu/event/special-event-trust-science-trust-democracy?delta=0) featuring a four-person panel (three academics and one journalist) discussing race as a factor that interrelates [trust in science and trust in democracy](https://datascience.harvard.edu/event/special-event-trust-science-trust-democracy?delta=0), specifically relating to vaccine hesitancy and social justice history. **Our [dedicated page](https://c19vax.scibeh.org/pages/vaxculture) provides more information about how cultural variables affect people's attitudes towards the COVID-19 vaccine and vaccines generally.** ## A few reasons to trust science [Gale Sinatra's and Barbara Hofer's upcoming book about science denial](https://rossier.usc.edu/magazine/ss2018/breaking-emotional-barriers-science-learning/) says that the public should trust science because it is a social activity that constructs valid knowledge through rigorous, collective processes. They base their claim on science historians and philosophers, such as [Naomi Oreskes](https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2019/10/in-why-trust-science-naomi-oreskes-explains-why-the-process-of-proof-is-worth-trusting/), as well as on decades of learning and developmental psychology research. With regard to COVID-19, [Sinatra and Hofer (2021)](https://rossier.usc.edu/magazine/ss2018/breaking-emotional-barriers-science-learning/) suggest that "Without a solid foundation in the tenets of science, people may be distrustful of scientists’ embrace of uncertainty and willingness to revise when new evidence strongly supports an alternative." People's trust of scientists may be related to their beliefs about how knowledge is constructed. Those who believe knowledge is purely objective may distrust when scientists discuss uncertainty in their findings [(Hofer, 2020)](https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/tl.20427?casa_token=6xYXk18VJYsAAAAA%3A584zqUxlF54BeKLrLDWyXPsVP-_cGsDBGYfsdoY3mhqFJfTBSF5TvSY0mhzuFjogUcaAiMOIOtbSACk). Although the scientific community gains greater confidence knowing the bounds of certainty, those that hold absolutist beliefs (i.e., that there is are definite truths in the world) may view scientific uncertainty as guessing. [ ![](https://i.imgur.com/4zvFFOV.png) Table from Kuhn (1991)](https://t4.tc.columbia.edu/faculty/dk100/faculty-profile/files/uhn_1999_Adevelopmentalmodelofcriticalthinking.pdf?_ga=2.74781269.619519284.1609773525-1703523905.1606926053) --- Absolutism is extreme, and it turns out that most people in the mainstream view knowledge as highly subjective ([Hofer, 2020](https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/tl.20427?casa_token=6xYXk18VJYsAAAAA%3A584zqUxlF54BeKLrLDWyXPsVP-_cGsDBGYfsdoY3mhqFJfTBSF5TvSY0mhzuFjogUcaAiMOIOtbSACk)). Alas, such subjective or multiplist thinking can also make individuals prone to disinformation about COVID-19. A good example involves "false-balance" reports on vaccination, which incorrectly present pro- and anti-vaccination representatives as if they were two sides of an ongoing debate. For example, the Great Barrington Declaration, which dangerously suggested that herd immunity was the best solution to the COVID-19 pandemic, was falsely portrayed as a scientific consensus statement. It was not. In reality, the scientific consensus instead endorsed the effectiveness of mask wearing, social distancing, and widespread administration of a COVID-19 vaccine ([Alwan et al., 2020](https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)32153-X/fulltext?fbclid=IwAR3SO1hvYsOLK8HPu_-Yrg_vARUyftB5TGVdxmUKYgeWObYnTPqpubSy6i8)). Another example involves presentations that offer false equivalence. This occurs when two sides of an argument are presented in what sounds like a debate, but the scientific consensus only supports one of those views, while the other is a fringe perspective without evidence to back it. False consensus and false equivalence heighten people’s confusion and decrease their trust in science and scientists. [Heindricks and colleagues (2016)](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Friederike_Hendriks/publication/297569382_Trust_in_Science_and_the_Science_of_Trust/links/5e368da592851c7f7f14a92b/Trust-in-Science-and-the-Science-of-Trust.pdf) argue that people's judgments about the trustworthiness of scientific information emerge from people's evaluations of scientists' expertise, integrity, and benevolence. Disinformation can contribute to people's erroneous evaluations of trustworthiness by purposefully attacking scientists' credentials, experience, honesty, and altruism. [Hotez (2021)](https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3001369) calls the most extreme manifestations of this animadversion "antiscience aggression". In addition to many historical examples that occurred in totalitarian and illiberal regimes, antiscience aggression by far-right groups became a recurring phenomenon during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, basing source judgments on a more reasoned and critical evaluative stance can help people increase their trust in scientists. **Our [dedicated page on argumentation](https://c19vax.scibeh.org/pages/argumentquality) provides more information about how the strength of arguments can be evaluated.** :::success Would you like to find out more about trust in scientists? We created a search query specifically for this page, which links you to other interesting resources like Twitter threads, blogposts, websites, videos and more. Check out the search query that we generated specifically for this page [here](https://hypothes.is/groups/Jk8bYJdN/behsci?q=trust). Would you like to know more about how we generated the search queries and how our underlying knowledge base works? Click [here](https://hackmd.io/B3R70tuNTiGy6wi9HObuSQ) to learn more. ::: ---- <sub>Page contributors: Doug Lombardi, David N. Rapp, Stephan Lewandowsky</sub> {%hackmd GHtBRFZdTV-X1g8ex-NMQg %} {%hackmd TLvrFXK3QuCTATgnMJ2rng %} {%hackmd oTcI4lFnS12N2biKAaBP6w %}
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Argument quality and fallacies

Arguments can be good or bad, and that difference is not just a matter of subjective preference. Rather, argumentation research has spent centuries identifying how and why some arguments are stronger than others. This includes understanding why some arguments (so-called ‘fallacies’) can fool the unwary into thinking they provide good reasons for believing or doing something when, in fact, they do not.

3/8/2024
Vaccine Deniers

Attitudes towards vaccines span a whole range, from full endorsement to complete rejection:<sub>Source: UNICEF</sub>

3/8/2024
Politics of COVID-19 Misinformation

The politics of misinformation related to COVID-19 In many countries, COVID-19 and measures to address it, including vaccination, have become heavily politicized with important negative effects in the public's willingness to be vaccinated and follow the WHO and government relevant guidelines. In this unit, we present findings that illustrate the politicization of Covid-19 and its disastrous effects (vaccine hesitancy, disobedience in measures like mask wearing etc.), as documented in research from all around the world. Then, we discuss the most significant factors that have contributed to this phenomenon (psychological characteristics of people, motivated misinformation by malevolent agents, conflicts of interest between countries and companies etc.). The politicization of COVID-19: evidence and effects A clear factor that affects beliefs and attitudes regarding Covid-19 is political ideology and partisanship. In a multi-country study conducted before Covid-19 vaccines were available, significant differences were found between countries, indicating that trust in government was a strong predictor of vaccine acceptance (Lazarus et al., 2021): people who trust their government are much more likely to accept getting vaccinated than those who do not. Many more studies have investigated the effect of partisan differences and epistemological attitudes on vaccine hesitancy in specific countries. After more than two years since the pandemic struck, a clear consensus has been formed: political partisanship significantly affects people's beliefs regarding Covid-19 and their attitudes towards vaccine and behavioral measures, often leading to science denialism and believing in conspiracy theories. America Beliefs In the United States, a worrisome partisan gap in perceptions regarding COVID-19 and responses to relevant government measures emerged between conservatives / republicans and progressives / democrats. For example, an analysis of over 1.1 million survey responses collected daily between April and September of 2020 found that levels of concern have come to deviate sharply between Republicans and Democrats over time, regardless of the incidence of the disease in respondents' local areas, as has individuals’ willingness to stay-at-home and reduce mobility in order to help contain the pandemic (Clinton et al., 2020). Similarly, Calvillo et al. (2020) found that U.S. conservatives tended to view the virus as less severe, and often believed that the spread of the virus was a conspiracy. Similarly, a longitudinal study on COVID attitudes identified a decrease in the willingness to vaccinate among Republicans, while Democrats attitudes remained stable (Fridman et al., 2021).

3/8/2024
Conspiracy theories

Pandemics have always been a fertile breeding ground for conspiracy theories, and the COVID-19 pandemic is no exception. When people suffer a loss of control or feel threatened, they become more vulnerable to believing conspiracies.

3/8/2024
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