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Boosting Understanding and Identification of Scientific Consensus Can Help to Correct False Beliefs
Aart van Stekelenburg1, Gabi Schaap1, Harm Veling1
1Behavioural Science Institute, Radboud University.
Psychological Science
|September 17, 2021
Summary
Teaching people to identify scientific consensus effectively corrects false beliefs about genetically engineered food. This strategy shows promise beyond simply stating scientific consensus.
Area of Science:
- Social Psychology
- Science Communication
Background:
- Misperceptions contrary to scientific evidence pose risks.
- Communicating scientific consensus aids belief accuracy but its effectiveness in correcting false beliefs is unclear.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate if a strategy enhancing understanding and identification of scientific consensus corrects misperceptions.
- To compare this strategy against simply communicating scientific consensus.
Main Methods:
- Three experiments involving over 1,500 U.S. adults with false beliefs.
- Participants learned to identify scientific consensus before reading a counter-attitudinal consensus message.
- Tested effectiveness in the domain of genetically engineered food.
Main Results:
- The two-step strategy significantly improved correction of misperceptions about genetically engineered food.
- This approach was more effective than merely communicating scientific consensus.
- Effectiveness for climate change misperceptions remains uncertain.
Conclusions:
- Boosting understanding and identification of scientific consensus is a viable strategy for correcting specific misperceptions.
- The approach shows domain-specific effectiveness.
- Further research is needed for complex issues like climate change.
Keywords:
belief changeboostingclimate changegenetically engineered foodmisperceptionsopen dataopen materialspreregisteredscience communicationscientific consensusMore Related Videos
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