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Assignment Title: 5
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Design a questionnaire to try to find out if the image of science held by the people surveyed is
generally positive or negative
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A list of some suggested topics is given overleaf
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E
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The impact of the ‘Mad Cow Disease’ (BSE) story on sales of beef in the 1980s
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g
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E
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Anti-nuclear demonstrations and changes in energy policies by governments in response
to the disaster at Fukushima
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g
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Additionally, you must analyse, compare and criticise the press coverage of your chosen
story in two different forms of publication:



A Tabloid Newspaper
New Scientist

Also you must argue whether or not you think the coverage was fair, accurate & reliable
overall, or whether you think the coverage was misleading or unnecessarily ‘scare
mongering’
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Your essay must be fully referenced using the Harvard system
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2 Understand the Public Perception of Science as Influenced by the
Media
Unit 5: Perceptions of Science

Task 3
Write a second in-depth essay, exactly as for Task 2, but choose another, different, scientific
story covered by the mass media
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g
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coli outbreaks)
The Foot & Mouth Crisis of 2001
Human Produced Carbon Dioxide & Climate Change
The ‘Mad Cow Disease’ (BSE) Scare of the 1980s
You may choose topics of your own that you are interested in, but discuss their suitability with
your tutor before beginning work on the assignment
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2 Understand the Public Perception of Science as Influenced by the
Media
Unit 5: Perceptions of Science

P2 – How the Public Perceive Science Questionnaire
Section 1 – About you
1
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What age group do you belong in?
15 – 25
26 – 36
Section 2 – Your view about science

37 – 48

49– 55

56+

3
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Where do you get your information on science stories/issues? PLEASE tick next to the
option
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How many hours do you spend on the above-stated sources a week? PLEASE tick next to
option,
 0 – 5 hours
 6- 10 hours
 11-15 hours
 16 – 20 hours
 21 + hours
6
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Does media influence children perspective about science?
YES

NO

How does it influence?
All of the above questions were included in my questionnaire
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About 30 people took part
in the survey
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Assignment Title: 5
...
5
16
15
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5
14
13
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According to my participant's answers,
most of them were female participants of about 16 and male were 15 (represented by above
right bar graph)
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As
seen in a far left bar graph, 16 people of age 15 – 25 took part
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No participants of age 49 – 55 took
part and a small minority of 2 of 56+ took part
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2 Understand the Public Perception of Science as Influenced by the
Media
Unit 5: Perceptions of Science

30
25
20
15
10
5
0
Interest in scientific ideas
YES

NO

Source of infomation
percentage %
Internet

9%
36%

31%

3%
21%

Scientific
journal
Daily
Newspaper

The remaining questions that I included were about science views and opinions of the
participants
...
This shows that perhaps the media has influenced a positive enforcement on
public to read different science articles and news
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This has immensely distributed with the fastest technologies compared to decades ago where
majority depended on daily newspapers and television
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Even though a small minority use scientific
journal resources
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no of participants
0 - 5 hours

3%
13%

6 - 10 hours

44%

17%

11 - 15 hours
16 - 20 hours

23%

21+ hours

Assignment Title: 5
...
One of the participants answered to question 6: Do you think science influences your
day to day work and lifestyle?
‘’ YES
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The most are health
articles disclosing findings of research about the risk of different diseases, beauty products
causing skin infection and cancer like sun cream, food products i
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genetically modified crops
bad for health articles to name a few
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’’
According to the questionnaire, vast majority of the audience think that children are both
positively and negatively influenced by media
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This news makes children think of how we came to existence and with their
overflowing young minds, their thirst for knowledge broadens up, which is definitely a good
sign
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But when findings of research are
altered or controversies of research get leaked, it alternates children’s point of view to
negativity and in influencing them to think whether science is bad?’’
This shows that after all science does change public perception but this is influenced by
media with their different reporting of news
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Different sources to change public views, as this depend on how accurate information is
reported on different sources; scientific journals are more accurate than newspaper articles
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Assignment Title: 5
...
It drew negative criticism from public
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Last night Dr Wakefield said: 'This new study confirms what we found in British children
and again with Professor O'Leary
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'They were developing normally until they regressed
...
’

Read more: http://www
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co
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html#ixzz3JbZsqckq studies disclosed the results to the public
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Thereby, this article influenced the parents of autistic children in believing that MMR triggered
their child's condition and this further strengthened the public concern despite some other
links dismissed by medical authorities and governments
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Now a team from the Wake Forest University School of Medicine in North Carolina are
examining 275 children with regressive autism and bowel disease - and of the 82 tested so
far, 70 prove positive for the measles virus

Assignment Title: 5
...
’’ Being
majority of children proven positive, this influences the public to believe that there are greater
chances of the MMR vaccine clearly linking to autism
...


At the time, Dr Wakefield said that although they had not proved a link between MMR
(measles, mumps, and rubella) and autism, there was cause for concern and the Government
should offer the option single vaccines - instead of only MMRs - until more research had been
done
...
Ten of the paper's authors also signed
retractions on the interpretation but stood by the science
...

Wrong interpretation of findings again draws public attention that this study may too have
been wrongly evaluated and hence, the conclusion of MMR linking to autism is not justified
...
It is being vastly
discussed in media, universities, schools and so on
...
Journals reporting science will have more detailed
reporting than other news articles
...


Source 1
’’Why the fascination with the end
of the world? ‘’
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The Telegraph

Assignment Title: 5
...

While the telegraph, provides simple headline that directly aims at people with minimum
scientific knowledge tells you that it has answers to your questions about LHC
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But why are we so obsessed with the
possibility of apocalypse?
The world will end
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But it may not be soon
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BBC News Magazine (Source 1)

What does the Large Hadron Collider
do?
It smashes together particles smaller
than atoms at near-light speed to
break them down into their
constituent parts and recreate
conditions which existed fractions of a
second after the Big Bang
...

This above-starting paragraph by The Telegraph (source 2) article clearly made a huge
impact with its simple concise paragraph, easy to understand clear language for all age target
audiences mainly to younger audiences and to those who have very little or no knowledge
about the accelerator
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Conclusion
From the above news analysis on how the news is put forth to public, shows that the way
news is portrayed in the media greatly varies between different news sources
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Due to high competition, it is highly likely that vast amount of money may sometimes influence
media representations
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The effects of reporting styles will influence differently to different groups of people
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2 Understand the Public Perception of Science as Influenced by the
Media
Unit 5: Perceptions of Science

other scientists on the extinction of the world
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Another factor is age groups
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For example,
source 2, points out to younger audiences with the simple understanding language of their
level
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All the above factors influence public perception of scientific news delivered/portrayed in
media
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D2
Overview of the relationship between science, media, and the public
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Science is an engine of economic growth
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Through media science influences public decisions and views even though science
is expensive and controversial in its own right
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But the nature of broadcasting science is complex and
requires dedicated understanding and effective intervention
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But often are not fully
informed or falsely informed
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One way in which I would characterize the media more generally in its science reporting is to
echo the first responder's comment about not providing enough information
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It does not appear that
most media reporters actually read this article, or at least if they do, they do not seem to really
understand what they have read
...
This survey is conducted 2014 using social listening and online research with the Ipsos
MORI Connects online community, alongside the nationwide face-to-face survey, to build a
picture of how the public engages with science online as well as offline
...

People are now more comfortable with the pace of change – just a third (34%, versus
49% in 1988) now agrees that “science makes people’s lives change too fast”
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2 Understand the Public Perception of Science as Influenced by the
Media
Unit 5: Perceptions of Science



A third (35%) still think that scientists adjust their findings to get the answers they
want, and three-in-ten (29%) think scientific research is never or only occasionally
checked by other scientists before being published
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All these findings show that the public take great interest in scientific ideas
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Before reporting all scientific data needs to be
carefully researched and reviewed before disclosing to public
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The government should also no try to interfere with scientific development
research further than funding research and act accordingly to public concerns about science
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This will ensure that no false news is delivered to the
public
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Conclusion
I think media is slowly moving to create positive contribution in some aspects, to public’s
perception of science despite its negative contribution over the past decades
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This shows that science has made a positive contribution in influencing the public positively
that it is very important to know science in daily life as compared to that of 37% in 1988
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g
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This makes
a positive contribution to the public perception of science
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An example is the MMR
vaccine, Dr
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His ideas didn't pass the requirements of a peer-reviewed journal, so basically he
had no data to support his claim, and he was banned from practicing as a doctor due to his
actions
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For example,
the scare over the swine flu virus was considered dangerous despite it’s no such evidence
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The public does value science but its
attitudes to science are not always consistent
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It promotes debate
because the media likes to be controversial
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Most scientific discoveries or issues are complicated and technical and nuanced
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People will not want to pay attention
long enough to truly understand a difficult scientific question
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But it's negative in
that it doesn't give us great information and answer the question that concerns the public
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2 Understand the Public Perception of Science as Influenced by the
Media
Unit 5: Perceptions of Science

Reference - all accessed on May 31, 2016
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http://www
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co
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pdf
https://www
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com/researchpublications/researcharchive/3357/Public-Attitudes-toScience-2014
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ipsos-mori
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pdf
http://www
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co
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pdf -Source 1
http://news
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co
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stm - 8 September 2008 Source 2
http://www
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co
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html - 30 March 2010
http://www
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co
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pdf
http://www
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co
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html
By SALLY BECK, Mail on Sunday
28/05/2006
http://www
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co

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