Not All Skepticism Is Equal: Exploring the Ideological Antecedents of Science Acceptance and Rejection

Abstract

Many topics that scientists investigate speak to people’s ideological worldviews. We report three studies—including an analysis of large-scale survey data—in which we systematically investigate the ideological antecedents of general faith in science and willingness to support science, as well as of science skepticism of climate change, vaccination, and genetic modification (GM). The main predictors are religiosity and political orientation, morality, and science understanding. Overall, science understanding is associated with vaccine and GM food acceptance, but not climate change acceptance. Importantly, different ideological predictors are related to the acceptance of different scientific findings. Political conservatism best predicts climate change skepticism. Religiosity, alongside moral purity concerns, best predicts vaccination skepticism. GM food skepticism is not fueled by religious or political ideology. Finally, religious conservatives consistently display a low faith in science and an unwillingness to support science. Thus, science acceptance and rejection have different ideological roots, depending on the topic of investigation.

The Impact of Source Credibility on Scientific Skepticism of Climate Change and Genetically Modified Foods: Findings from the General Social Survey

“…Instead, our results suggest that ideology is indirectly related to skepticism about GE and biotechnology. This finding is consistent with other work pointing to latent antecedents of political ideology that impact perceptions of specific science topics (McCright, 2016;Pechar et al, 2018;Rutjens et al, 2018). Indeed, Pechar et al (2018) recently reported that attitudes towards government and corporations (two important sources in the debate over GMOs) mediate the relationship between ideology and trust in science.…”

“…Both also exist within complicated communicative contexts, with various stakeholders making multiple and sometimes conflicting claims about the nature and consequences of CC and GM (Clancy, 2016;Dunlap & Jacques, 2013;McCright & Dunlap, 2000;Roe & Tiesl, 2007). Interpretative schemata, such as pre-existing attitudes and identity, influence audiences' judgements of information sources, including scientists and technical experts (Kahan, et al, 2010;Passini, 2010;Pechar et al, 2018;Rutjens et al, 2018). Differences in the role of ideology on public skepticism about CC and GM warrant further investigation, particularly with more recent data that reflect increasing political polarization and greater control over exposure to scientific information and sources.…”

“…Individuals filter scientific information through interpretive schemata and use moral reasoning to make decisions (Passini, 2010). Pre-existing beliefs, values and identity, political affiliation, socio-economic status and other factors influence public attitudes about science and trust in scientific evidence (Kahan, Jenkins-Smith, & Brahman, 2010;Pechar, Brenauer, & Mayer, 2018;Rutjens et al, 2018). Recent work has suggested that lack of trust in science and perceptions of scientific bias have contributed to conflicting understandings and even skepticism of CC and GM (Funk & Kennedy, 2016a-b;Krosnick, Holbrook, Lowe, & Visser, 2006;McComas, Besley, & Steinhardt, 2014;Pechar et al, 2018;Vraga, Myers, Kotcher, Beall, & Maibach, 2018).…”

Psychological and experiential factors affecting climate change perception: learnings from a transnational empirical study and implications for framing climate-related flood events

“…Political affiliation was a significant predictor of activism support as well as belief and trust in climate change science and experts -those with a left-leaning political affiliation were more likely to be active or passive supporters than not support climate activism. The rejection of anthropogenic climate change was best predicted by political conservatism as supported by previous research (Rutjens et al 2018, Pickering et al 2020. A similar result was found for trust in climate experts and climate science which suggests that left-leaning political parties tend to acknowledge the effects of climate change and the trustworthiness of the science and experts who study it.…”

Conflict and resistance

“…We are living in a moment of both rapid penal reform and intense political debate about the purpose and mode of punishment. Science is also increasingly debated and questioned, and there are growing concerns of scientific skepticism (Rutjens, Sutton, & van der Lee, 2017;Tom, 2017). It is therefore worth examining how penal reform that incorporates scientific research is received by penal institutions and those that work and provide services within them.…”