Cosa pensa la gente della scienza e della tecnologia?

“As science becomes more ubiquitous, it becomes a victim of its own success, placed under greater external pressure to reflect consciously on its political, economic, and cultural contexts”.

Global Governance of Science, Report, DG Research, 2009

La necessità del dialogo

• Fiducia e supporto• Governance• Arruolamento• Informazione, comunicazione

La necessità del dialogo

Le persone non possiedono solo una conoscenza scientifica ma hanno anche:

• Opinioni• Aspettative• Paure• Bisogni• Emozioni

“The scientific images that populate our head do not only take the shape of more or less approximate concepts, facts, notions, data. They also – and previously – exist in the ambiguous, contradictory and very interesting form of stratified metaphors, symbols, dreams, fears that interact through osmosis and several exchanges. (…) Before reading a textbook or a popular science magazine, the common individual builds his/her representation of science and scientist by sniffing it, more or less consciously, in soap operas, in films, in figurative arts, in music. Therefore, studying the scientific culture also means to study those semi-invisible paths and those contradictions, which are embarrassing and very interesting.”

Yuri Castelfranchi, For a paleonthology of scientific imaginery, Jcom 02 03, 2003

Studi di percezione della scienza da parte del pubblico

The standard Eurobarometer (from 1973). Each survey consists in approximately 1000 face-to-face interviews per Member State. Conducted between 2 and 5 times per year. Special Eurobarometer reports are based on in-depth thematical studies carried out for various services of the European Commission or other EU Institutions .

CCEB: Its methodology was almost identical to that of the Standard Eurobarometer. One report was published each year, excluding the special reports

Flash Eurobarometer surveys - Ad hoc thematical telephone interviews, enable the Commission to obtain results relatively quickly and to focus on specific target groups (i.e. doctors, SMEs, etc.) The qualitative studies investigate in-depth the motivations, the feelings, the reactions of selected social groups towards a given subject or concept, by discussion groups or with non-directive interviews.

http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/index_en.htm

Young men indicated that they were far more interested (i.e. they said they were very interested) in new inventions and technologies (54% vs. 30% of young women) and ICT (45% vs. 28% of young women). Young women, on the other hand, were more likely to say they were very interested in the Earth and the environment (45% vs. 37% of young men), the human body and medical discoveries (47% vs. 29% of young men)

Young men showed a higher level of interest in innovations in the fields of computer and video surveillance techniques, nuclear energy and nanotechnology. However, while young women were frequently not aware, or aware but not interested, in innovations in these fields, they showed a higher level of interest in innovations related to brain research, human embryo research and GM foods. Men, on the other hand, were more likely to be not informed or not interested in innovations in these fields.For example, a fifth of young women had not heard about innovations related to computer and video surveillance compared to just 13% of young men. Furthermore, while almost six out 10 young men (57%) were aware and interested in such innovations, only half as many were aware but not interested (29%). Among the young women, equal proportions were either aware and interested or aware and notinterested (both 40%). No differences were observed between young men and women in the awareness of, and interest in, innovations in mobile phone technology.

I bambini, i ragazzi e la scienza

Partners from IT, FR, PT, RO, PL, CZ

Francia – “Una persona che lavora nella scienza e fa esperimenti con liquidi tossici”

Francia – L’entomologo

Francia - Il botanico

Polonia – Lo scienziato pazzo e distratto come tutti gli scienziati dovrebbero essere

Portogallo – Einstein e il triste coniglio esplosivo

Francia: “Gli scienziati sono tutti così: a loro piace fare le dissezioni

Romania – “Il mio disegno mostra come le persone inqunano l’ambiente a causa delle ricerche nucleari”

Francia – “La scienziata sta sezionando un topo” Polonia – “Gli esperimenti di

Frankenstein su un cane”

Romania: “He is a chemist, who cares for the good of the planet, and try to find solutions for the problems that exist”

Italy: “I think that scientists are enlithened persons, who help the society to develop. They are essential”

Italy: “I wanted to express that science is sinonimous of perfection, experimentation and personal ideas”

Romania: “He is scientist who think to the felicity of all, to the good of the planet, and looks for solutions for every problem.”

“Secondo te, che cosa dovrebbero studiare gli scienziati per migliorare il futuro dell’Europa? Elenca tre cose”

ROSE, The Relevance of Science Education, is an international comparative project designed to shed light on affective factors of importance to the learning of science and technology. The target population is students towards the end of secondary school (age 15). The research instrument used was a questionnaire mostly consisting of closed questions with four-point Likert scales. Among other issues, the questionnaire addressed young people’s interests in learning aboutvarious topics, their experience with, and views of, school science, and their views and attitudes related to science in society.

− Do young people value the outcomes of scientific and the technological development?− Do young people value their science classes?− What values guide young people in their choice of an education and a job?

Three perspectives that that might be significant in understanding the empirical results and the low recruitment of students to S&T studies in more economically developed Societies:

− Issues that are perceived as being meaningful to young people in a country are dependent on the culture and the material conditions in the country− An educational choice is an identity choice− Young people wish to be passionate about what they are doing, and they wish to develop themselves and their abilities.

They have a range of possible and accessible futures, and among the many options, they choose the most interesting.

Women in science

The Helsinki Group on Women and Science

Named after their first meeting in Helsinki in November 1999, Helsinki Group was set up to bring together national representatives from all the EU Member States and countries associated. They meet twice a year and provide a forum for dialogue about national policies.

The Helsinki Group helps the Commission build a picture of the situation on the ground at the national level. It has, in particular, appointed national statistical correspondents to help the Commission gather and compile sex-disaggregated statistics and build gender-sensitive indicators.

The Helsinki Group members have produced national reports on the situation of women scientists in their respective countries in 2002.

A report entitled ‘National policies on women and science in Europe’ (2002) describes and analyses different national contexts and policies

The report "Benchmarking policy measures for gender equality in science" published in 2008 updates the previous report.

The report ”SHE figures" preliminary for 2009