[Vision2020] "Cultural Cognition", not Stupidity

[Ron Force]

May 29, 2012
Study rules out stupidity as a cause of disbelief in climate science
And the Yale research published today reveals that if 
Americans knew more basic science and were more proficient in technical 
reasoning it would still result in a gap between public and scientific 
consensus.
>Indeed, as members of the public become more science 
literate and numerate, the study found, individuals belonging to 
opposing cultural groups become even more divided on the risks that 
climate change poses.
>Funded by the National Science Foundation, 
the study was conducted by researchers associated with the Cultural 
Cognition Project at Yale Law School and involved a nationally 
representative sample of 1500 U.S. adults.
>"The aim of the study 
was to test two hypotheses," said Dan Kahan, Elizabeth K. Dollard 
Professor of Law and Professor of Psychology at Yale Law School and a 
member of the study team. "The first attributes political controversy 
over climate change to the public's limited ability to comprehend 
science, and the second, to opposing sets of cultural values. The 
findings supported the second hypothesis and not the first," he said.
>"Cultural cognition" is the term used to describe the process by which 
individuals' group values shape their perceptions of societal risks. It 
refers to the unconscious tendency of people to fit evidence of risk to 
positions that predominate in groups to which they belong. 
>The 
results of the study were consistent with previous studies that show 
that individuals with more egalitarian values disagree sharply with 
individuals who have more individualistic ones on the risks associated 
with nuclear power, gun possession, and the HPV vaccine for school 
girls.
via www.enn.com
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman.fsr.com/pipermail/vision2020/attachments/20120529/db818811/attachment.html>