At a time when misinformation is rife and many seem to be questioning scientific evidence, do people really trust scientists' In the United Kingdom, the answer is mostly yes, finds a study led by the Policy Institute at King's College London and Sense about Science, a charity based in London. To explore what drives trust and distrust of scientists, the researchers used regression modelling to identify factors most strongly associated with trust. The most influential factors were whether respondents felt that scientists are "on the side of people like them" and whether they thought of scientists as open and transparent. Both outweighed perceptions of scientific expertise. Previous research has shown that benevolence ' the idea that researchers care about society and want to do good ' is a core pillar of public trust in science1. Now Bobby Duffy, director of the Policy Institute at King's College London and one of the authors of the UK study, says that the work reveals that trust in...
learn more
