As applied public health scientists, epidemiologists can experience first hand the frustrations of having their data ignored, distorted, or misunderstood. Science writers are another group that can experience similar frustrations of failing to communicate effectively about science facts. Recently, a conference and workshop were held at the University of Wisconsin to dissect the causes of “science denial” and to apply the insights gleaned to devising more effective communication.  The lessons learned and ideas for solutions are of considerable interest to epidemiologists and other scientists.

Goal of the Conference

As stated in the publicity, “Science writers now work in an age where uncomfortable ideas and truths meet organized resistance. Opposing scientific consensus on such things as anthropogenic climate change, the theoryof evolution, and even the astonishingly obvious benefits of vaccination has become politically de rigueur, a litmus test and a genuine threat to science. How does denial affect the craft of the science writer? How can science writers effectively explain disputed science?”

According to the organizers, one of the highlights of the conference was the presentation by Sean Carroll, a University of Madison Wisconsin professor of molecular biology and genetics and vice president for science education at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Carroll’s talk was entitled “The Denial of Evolution and the Evolution of Denial”.

He recounted his early encounters with persons who deny the existence of evolution and thought initially the resistance was “about the data”. He finally came to understand he said that the resistance to evolution, as well as that to other current science controversies of the day, has its roots in other non-data related causes.

In his presentation, Carroll compiled what he believes amounts to a “Manual of Denialism” for all of science from a paper he read tracing the history of anti-vaccination arguments put forward by chiropractors over several decades. This is a common “playbook” with six arguments that come up repeatedly regardless of whether the anti-science ideas relate to evolution, vaccination, climate change, or other topics, Carroll told the attendees. He said that he can now fit any argument made against evolution or scientific topics into one of these six categories. They are:

1. Doubt the science
According to Carroll, this works by simply making any kind of argument that can be thought of that casts doubt on the science finding.

2. Question the motives or integrity of the scientists.
According to Carroll, this amounts to saying that scientists have another agenda, for example, saying that scientists have a profit motive.

3. Magnify the disagreements by citing gadflies as authorities.
This consists of exaggerating legitimate disagreements by scientists or stating that a balanced view of opposing sides must be taken when in fact the size of the two constituencies in the scientific community in not equal. As the conference planning documents state, “There are multiple sides to every story---but not every opinion deserves equal ink or bandwidth.”

4. Exaggerate potential harms even if the science is correct.
This argument may be used if the others are not working by saying that even if the findings are correct, then the potential harms are dangerous.

 5. Appeal to personal freedom
This argument works well, particularly with Americans, according to Carroll. One often hears, “I’m an American, so I don’t have to.”

6. Acceptance would repudiate a key philosophy
This argument states that to accept the findings would repudiate a key philosophy or belief and may be one of the more important reasons for resistance.

The two-day event was organized with four key note speakers and panel discussions on the first day followed by a workshop on the second day during which participants were to apply the insights they obtained.

The University has made the presentations from the first day available online in high quality videos which show the speakers and the panel discussions. A journal article describing the Conference in Environmental Health Perspectives provided an overview of the conference including observations from many of the participants.

Readers interested in learning more about the conference proceedings may visit:

http://sciencedenial.wisc.edu