John Kotcher

Does Engagement in Advocacy Hurt the Credibility of Scientists? Results from a Randomized National Survey Experiment

ABSTRACT It is often assumed that issue advocacy will compromise the credibility of scientists. We conducted a randomized controlled experiment to test public reactions to six different advocacy statements made by a scientist—ranging from a purely informational statement to an endorsement of specific policies. We found that perceived credibility of the communicating scientist was uniformly high in five of the six message conditions, suffering only when he advocated for a specific policy—building more nuclear power plants (although credibility did not suffer when advocating for a different specific policy—carbon dioxide limits at power plants). We also found no significant differences in trust in the broader climate science community between the six message conditions. Our results suggest that climate scientists who wish to engage in certain forms of advocacy have considerable latitude to do so without risking harm to their credibility, or the credibility of the scientific community.

Partisan differences in the relationship between newspaper coverage and concern over global warming.

The effects of news media on public opinion about global warming have been a topic of much interest in both academic and popular discourse. Empirical evidence in this regard, however, is still limited and somewhat mixed. This study used data from the 2006 General Social Survey in combination with a content analysis of newspaper coverage of the same time period to examine the relationship between general news climate and public concern about global warming. Results showed a pattern of political polarization, with increased coverage associated with growing divergence between Democrats and Republicans. Further analysis also showed evidence of reactivity in partisan response to coverage from different news outlets. These findings point to a particular form of politically motivated, biased processing of news information.

Issue-Specific Engagement: How Facebook Contributes to Opinion Leadership and Efficacy on Energy and Climate Issues

ABSTRACT Although social media are increasingly studied for their political impact, not enough is known about how distinct forms of Facebook activity, such as general news consumption and expression vs. issue-specific engagement, explain orientations toward a particular issue. Using a Republican sample, we demonstrate that only issue-specific engagement on Facebook—and not other forms of online behaviors—is consistently associated with a greater sense of personal influence on the issue of climate change and energy, which suggests that distinguishing between types of Facebook activity is important.

Predictors of trust in the general science and climate science research of US federal agencies

In this article, we focus on a key strategic objective of scientific organizations: maintaining the trust of the public. Using data from a nationally representative survey of American adults (n = 1510), we assess the extent to which demographic factors and political ideology are associated with citizens’ trust in general science and climate science research conducted by US federal agencies. Finally, we test whether priming individuals to first consider agencies’ general science research influences trust in their climate science research, and vice versa. We found that federal agencies’ general science research is more trusted than their climate science research—although a large minority of respondents did not have an opinion—and that political ideology has a strong influence on public trust in federal scientific research. We also found that priming participants to consider general scientific research does not increase trust in climate scientific research. Implications for theory and practice are discussed.

Controversy matters: Impacts of topic and solution controversy on the perceived credibility of a scientist who advocates

In this article, we focus on the potential influence of a scientist’s advocacy position on the public’s perceived credibility of scientists as a whole. Further, we examine how the scientist’s solution position (information only, non-controversial, and controversial) affects the public’s perception of the scientist’s motivation for sharing information about specific issues (flu, marijuana, climate change, severe weather). Finally, we assess how perceived motivations mediate the relationship between solution position and credibility. Using data from a quota sample of American adults obtained by Qualtrics (n = 2,453), we found that in some conditions advocating for a solution positively predicted credibility, while in one condition, it negatively predicted scientist credibility. We also found that the influence of solution position on perceived credibility was mediated by several motivation perceptions; most notably through perception that the scientist was motivated to: (a) serve the public and (b) persuade the public. Further results and implications are discussed.