Nicole Kronberger

Biotechnology and the European public

The latest European sample survey of public perceptions of biotechnology reveals widespread opposition to genetically modified (GM) food in much of Europe, but public attitudes to medical and environmental applications remain positive.

COLLECTIVE SYMBOLIC COPING WITH NEW TECHNOLOGY: KNOWLEDGE, IMAGES AND PUBLIC DISCOURSE

Using data from policy analyses, media analyses and a European-wide survey about public perceptions of biotechnology conducted in 1996 and again in 1999, it is shown how a countrys public develops an everyday understanding of a new technology (genetic modification) construed as potentially harmful by the media. To understand the reliance on images and related beliefs, we propose a theory of collective symbolic coping. It identifies four steps: first, the creation of awareness; second, production of divergent images; third, convergence upon a couple of dominant images in the public sphere; fourth, normalization. It is suggested that symbolic coping occurs in countries where a recent increase in policy activity and of media reporting has alerted the public; that this public show a high proportion of beliefs in menacing images; that these beliefs are relatively independent of pre-existing popular science knowledge; and that they are functionally equivalent to scientific knowledge in providing judgmental confidence and reducing self-ascribed ignorance. These propositions are shown to be true in Austria and Greece. Several implications of the theory are discussed, including social representation theory and public understanding of science.

The 2010 Eurobarometer on the life sciences

Since 1991, the triennial Eurobarometer survey has assessed public attitudes about biotech and the life sciences in Europe. The latest 2010 Eurobarometer survey on the Life Sciences and Biotechnology (http://ec.europa.eu/research/science-society/document_library/pdf_06/europeans-biotechnology-in-2010_en.pdf), based on representative samples from 32 European countries, hints at a new era in the relations between science and society. We see less criticism of technology based on distrust in government and industry; more enthusiasm for novel technologies; and a more sophisticated appraisal of what technologies offer in terms of benefits, safety and sustainability. Europeans want regulation in the public interest and want a voice in such regulation when social values are at stake; we highlight an emerging European landscape of social value differences that shape peoples views of technologies.

Europeans and Biotechnology in 2010: Winds of change?

George Gaskell and colleagues designed, analysed and interpreted the Eurobarometer 73.1 on the Life Sciences and Biotechnology as part of the research project Sensitive Technologies and European Public Ethics (STEPE), funded by the Science in Society Programme of the EC’s Seventh Framework Programme for Research and Technological Development (FP7).

Consequences of media information uptake and deliberation: focus groups’ symbolic coping with synthetic biology

Whenever a new, potentially controversial technology enters public awareness, stakeholders suggest that education and public engagement are needed to ensure public support. Both theoretical and empirical analyses suggest, however, that more information and more deliberation per se will not make people more supportive. Rather, taking into account the functions of public sense-making processes, attitude polarisation is to be expected. In a real-world experiment, this study on synthetic biology investigated the effect of information uptake and deliberation on opinion certainty and opinion valence in natural groups. The results suggest (a) that biotechnology represents an important anchor for sense-making processes of synthetic biology, (b) that real-world information uptake and deliberation make people feel more certain about their opinions, and (c) that group attitudes are likely to polarise over the course of deliberation if the issue is important to the groups.

How Natural Is “More Natural”? The Role of Method, Type of Transfer, and Familiarity for Public Perceptions of Cisgenic and Transgenic Modification

A frequent expert assumption is that the public will consider cisgenics more “natural” and therefore more acceptable than transgenics. Experimental (Studies 1 and 2) and representative survey (Eurobarometer) data highlight that public concerns indeed are stronger when the boundaries of species are crossed. However, genetic combinations that could come into existence naturally are not always considered unproblematic. Human intervention in the process amplifies concern while familiarity with the method and its products explains little of the variance. Although cisgenics is more supported than transgenics, a majority of respondents across countries considers cisgenic products to be genetically modified food that must be labeled.

The influence of stereotype threat on immigrants: review and meta-analysis

In many regions around the world students with certain immigrant backgrounds underachieve in educational settings. This paper provides a review and meta-analysis on one potential source of the immigrant achievement gap: stereotype threat, a situational predicament that may prevent students to perform up to their full abilities. A meta-analysis of 19 experiments suggests an overall mean effect size of 0.63 (random effects model) in support of stereotype threat theory. The results are complemented by moderator analyses with regard to circulation (published or unpublished research), cultural context (US versus Europe), age of immigrants, type of stereotype threat manipulation, dependent measures, and means for identification of immigrant status; evidence on the role of ethnic identity strength is reviewed. Theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed.

Communicating Synthetic Biology: from the lab via the media to the broader public

We present insights from a study on communicating Synthetic Biology conducted in 2008. Scientists were invited to write press releases on their work; the resulting texts were passed on to four journalists from major Austrian newspapers and magazines. The journalists in turn wrote articles that were used as stimulus material for eight group discussions with select members of the Austrian public. The results show that, from the lab via the media to the general public, communication is characterized by two important tendencies: first, communication becomes increasingly focused on concrete applications of Synthetic Biology; and second, biotechnology represents an important benchmark against which Synthetic Biology is being evaluated.

Quantitative and qualitative research across cultures and languages: cultural metrics and their application.

Growing globalisation of the world draws attention to cultural differences between people from different countries or from different cultures within the countries. Notwithstanding the diversity of people’s worldviews, current cross-cultural research still faces the challenge of how to avoid ethnocentrism; comparing Western-driven phenomena with like variables across countries without checking their conceptual equivalence clearly is highly problematic. In the present article we argue that simple comparison of measurements (in the quantitative domain) or of semantic interpretations (in the qualitative domain) across cultures easily leads to inadequate results. Questionnaire items or text produced in interviews or via open-ended questions have culturally laden meanings and cannot be mapped onto the same semantic metric. We call the culture-specific space and relationship between variables or meanings a ’cultural metric’, that is a set of notions that are inter-related and that mutually specify each other’s meaning. We illustrate the problems and their possible solutions with examples from quantitative and qualitative research. The suggested methods allow to respect the semantic space of notions in cultures and language groups and the resulting similarities or differences between cultures can be better understood and interpreted.

Synthetic biology: taking a look at a field in the making

This special issue assembles four articles and a commentary dealing with the emerging field of synthetic biology. “What’s in a name?,” Nature Biotechnology asked in a late 2009 feature. The responses of the twenty interviewed experts highlight that synthetic biology comprises many different projects, approaches and definitions. “If you ask five people to define synthetic biology, you will get six answers,” one of the interviewees states (p. 1073). In fact, the term synthetic biology is not new but about to celebrate its centenary; it was coined in 1912 by the French chemist Stéphane Leduc (de Lorenzo and Danchin, 2008). However, it recently gained publicity when selected as an umbrella term for a newly forming academic field. The First International Conference on Synthetic Biology (SB1.0) was held in 2004 and since then the term has rapidly gained ground in academia, business and policy circles. But what is synthetic biology? In 2005 the European Commission convened a high-level expert group to define and examine the new development. The report begins by defining synthetic biology as “the engineering of biology: the synthesis of complex, biologically based (or inspired) systems which display functions that do not exist in nature. This engineering perspective may be applied at all levels of the hierarchy of biological structures – from individual molecules to whole cells, tissues and organisms. In essence, synthetic biology will enable the design of ‘biological systems’ in a rational and systematic way” (European Commission, 2005: 5). With synthetic biology, the conceptual tools and language of engineering become the actual method for approaching biology so that engineering now is more than an analogy, as it was for genetic engineering (de Lorenzo and Danchin, 2008). Synthetic biology represents an interdisciplinary endeavour with contributions from biology, biotechnology, engineering and computing. Both based on the encyclopaedic knowledge of the post-genomic era and with the help of computer power, the challenge becomes “programming” standardised biological parts to create functional systems. Such “designed life,” for example, shall make it possible to produce new drugs, vaccines or biofuels, or to facilitate the bioremediation of toxic chemicals. The very first products of synthetic biology are approaching market reality but most applications might take time until they are suitable for commercial exploitation (Kwok, 2010). Although the field is unified by a name, some basic questions remain unanswered. For example, scientists disagree whether synthetic biology should be seen as a new development or as a convergence of older streams of scientific inquiry and practice. Is it really a paradigm change, as some claim, or is it just a rebranding of genetic or metabolic engineering? Is synthetic biology’s agenda about knowing and understanding (as is typical for science) or is it about doing and constructing (as is typical for engineering)? Does synthetic biology really offer the potential for incredible progress or is it just “hype” and a useful way to attract Sage PublicationS (www.sagepublications.com) Public underStanding of Science