The Balance of Individual and Infrastructure Values in Decisions Regarding Advanced Science and Technology

Abstract

A country’s scientific technology policy rarely reflects public opinion. In this study, we created a hierarchical model of societal well-being, comprising five value components for both individual and infrastructure well-being, to analyze the balance among these values. We conducted a survey in two stages; first, both individual and infrastructure well-being were investigated, and then the weights between pairs of value categories composing individual and infrastructure well-being were scored to assess which categories were most important. The analysis of the first stage used the score magnitudes, while that of the second stage used the analytic hierarchy process. The results showed that people value individual well-being more than infrastructure well-being. For both types of well-being, values related to the economy and safety were ranked as more important than the other values, but the weights were distributed over all value components. For individual well-being, the most important value category was the one related to safety, while for infrastructure well-being, it was economy. Therefore, people prioritize different values for themselves and for society as a whole. This suggests that when making decisions regarding technology, it is necessary to understand its effects on all fields and consider the balance between the value categories of well-being.

How Knowledge about or Experience with Hydrogen Fueling Stations Improves Their Public Acceptance

“…This is because the current hydrogen station construction and FCV purchase costs are higher than those of the existing technology. Previous studies have shown that safety and economics are important in terms of infrastructure and individual values [30]. In addition, although this study built an acceptability model for HSs, it could not deal with the relationship between consciousness and actual behavior and the continuity of knowledge and technical reliability through experience.…”