Day 2: 2011 Science Communication Conference #SCC2011

Day 1: 2011 Science Communication Conference #SCC2011

Young Europeans Discuss Sustainable Development

I have been absent from this blog because I have been organising the Young Europeans Discuss Sustainable Development from the point of view of science and technology event:

Young Europeans Discuss Sustainable Development
9-14 of May 2011

Advances in Science and Technology directly affectyour life, and you should have an opinion!

28 Young Europeans (18-24 years old) from 13 EU countries, will be discussing with Greek scientists about6 different aspects of Sustainable development.

at www.ensaa.eu: 

Meet the 23 scientists that will talk at the event! They work at almost all of the big Greek universities and research centres!

Learn about the issues that will be discussed: 

Climate Change, Energy, Innovation, Water and Food, Biodiversity, Public Health

Chat with other people!

Check out what will be happening during that week!

Find out about the participants!

Watch online, ask questions for the scientists to answer, vote!

The event language is English.

Please forward this to your members and whoever you think might be interested.

For more information do not hesitate to contact us at yedsda@gmail.com

Dr Ino Agrafioti

Science and Society: My analysis of the Eurobarometer (1)

So I finally finished gathering my data and did my plots. Before I get into specifics about what exactly did the Greek sample say, I want to mention four things that I found striking:

1. there was significantly more emphasis in the Greek answers: Even though, in most questions their beliefs appear to be similar to those of other Europeans, their answers were more "emphatic" i.e. their answers were less divided compared to other EU countries. I noticed this by eye, and in an effort to "quantify" it, I ranked all European countries according to their responses using the graph charts presented in the Eurobarometer report. In these graphs, the countries were plotted in descending order, according to the value of the majority and minority percentages in those questions. The country on the far left was thus ranked "1" since it showed the greatest majority percentage. Similarly the country on the far right was ranked "28" (the average of all 27 EU countries was included in the ranking).
   
   In the following graph I present the distribution of rankings of the EU27 average:
   
   
   As expected the average of "EU27 average" (as calculated in the report) rankings was 15, i.e. in the middle. The EU27 average rankings ranged from 11 to 19.
   
   I did not calculate the rankings for all countries - that would be too much work I am afraid. I first calculated them for Greece and the UK, given that these are the countries I am comparing here. I also calculated them for Italy (as an example of another Mediterranean country), Germany (a central European country with a strong science base and a long history of science communication, to make sure that there is no "UK vs the continent" bias) and Denmark (as an example of a country widely known for being very technologically advanced and innovative).
   
   I could have chosen other countries for these comparisons. For example, I could have chosen Cyprus as the Mediterranean example, but a lot of the answers of the Cypriot sample were too similar to the Greek sample. I found this also very interesting (is this an example of how culture shapes people's relationship with S&T?).
   
   Here are the equivalent to the above plot for each of the countries mentioned above:
   
   When the graphs above are compared, one sees that the majority of the Greek sample's rankings tended to be a lot higher, whereas the  majority of the UK sample's rankings tended to be lower compared to the other countries. The average ranking for Greece was 9 and for UK was 17, whereas for Italy was 16, for Germany was 14 and Denmark was 14.
   The Italian, German and Danish ranking ranges look very similar - spread out over the whole range.
   
   
2. they replied a lot more than the EU average: the average "Don't Knows" for Greece was 2% whereas for the EU27 averages was 5%. Thus, Greek people seemed more sure about what to reply compared to all other Europeans. I calculated this to look at the "ignorance" factor, which could have lead to the above emphasis. I.e. it could be that the results in point 1 above were so striking because Greek people did not know what to answer. But this does not seem to be the case.
   
   
3. the Greek sample seemed a bit confused on what they feel about S&T: in many questions Greek people were positive about S&T but in even more questions they were negative about it. This is striking given the emphasis with which the answered these questions. More on this point in the following posts and in my concluding post.
   
   
4. the difference in the rankings of Greece and UK were striking: in most questions they were on the opposite ends of the plots!

So these are some general conclusions I drove from the whole analysis. In the following posts, I will look at those questions on which the answers were most interesting.

Science and Society: step 2 is to plot the data...

This is just a teaser of the data i am plotting. This is maybe the question that has the biggest difference between Greece and the UK, but I am half way through all the eurobarometer tables.

So a lot more Greek people feel that "because of their knowledge, scientists have a power that makes them dangerous". When all EU27 countries are ranked according to their belief in this statement, Greece is on the one end of the spectrum (2nd most agreeing) and the UK is at the other end of the spectrum (6th least agreeing).

Could this maybe be part of the explanation to my question, for the difference between the two countries?

Science and Society: step 1 is to set the question...

Why is there reaction to science-related issues in some countries, and in others not so much?

Having lived for almost a decade in a country where there were big reactions to science issues (MMR, mad cow, etc), and having moved back to a country where the reactions are not so big - one could say non-existent - it makes me wonder why is this the case?

Of course it comes down to society, but why? What I mean is, of course there are big differences between the British and Greek societies, but which of these differences cause reaction in the former and not in the latter?

This question has been brewing in my mind for quite sometime now since it is different to communicate science to a society that is against it, than to a society that simply does not care. (A related question: why it does not care?)

Ι decided to set the task of answering the question above when I read the rapid response of some people in - once again - the UK.

In a recent comment, Guardian columnist Simon Jenkins (you can find the article here), basically said that scientists, with Martin Rees and Lord May as their archbishops, "just want money" "based on faith, not reason". Jennifer Rohn, two days later published a post in her blog were she "proposed making Monday," today that is, "Spoof Jenks day, with bloggers taking the opportunity to writing an anti-science post in the style of Simon Jenkins". The idea was well received and in just 2 days there were not 1, not 2, not 5 but 11 Spoof Jenkins posts (you can find them at the end of this post but for a more updated list please check at the original post by Jennifer Rohn). Please also use the "#SpoofJenks" hashtag on twitter.

So this is a science-related issue and there was a fast reaction from the scientists. (I am so damn impressed when the reaction is so great!). In other cases, it is the creationists that react fast. I does not matter who does. Here I am talking about the reaction itself.

It makes me wonder, why is it that in the UK, in France, in the US, in Germany, etc there are reactions whereas in other countries there are not that many? Is it just my unfamiliarity with Greek reality or is this truly the case?

So, for the next couple of months this is what I will be thinking about... any help, ideas, will be much appreciated!


PS. The SpoofJenks posts
1. Get over it, scientists: your cushy days are numbered
2. Urgent new priority for UK science
3. A Mammoth of Research
4.Jenks from tectum to rectum
5. Perpetual Poetry in Motion
6. Not a guest post and not by Simon Jenkins
7. Simon Jenkins collects his tithe
8. A day in the life of Simon Jenkins
9. We know too much
10. Cancer: Scaremongering 'Scientists' Ramp Up The Fear
11. Bloody scientists think they know everything