Testing the cultural-invariance hypothesis: a global analysis of the relationship between scientific knowledge and attitudes to science

Sturgis, Patrick ORCID: 0000-0003-1180-3493, Brunton-Smith, Ian, Allum, Nick and Fuglsang, Simon (2024) Testing the cultural-invariance hypothesis: a global analysis of the relationship between scientific knowledge and attitudes to science. PLOS ONE, 19 (2). ISSN 1932-6203

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Abstract

A substantial body of research has demonstrated that science knowledge is correlated with attitudes towards science, with most studies finding a positive relationship between the two constructs; people who are more knowledgeable about science tend to be more positive about it. However, this evidence base has been almost exclusively confined to high and middle-income democracies, with poorer and less developed nations excluded from consideration. In this study, we conduct the first global investigation of the science knowledge-attitude relationship, using the 2018 Wellcome Global Monitor survey. Our results show a positive knowledge-attitude correlation in all but one of the 144 countries investigated. This robust cross-national relationship is consistent across both science literacy and self-assessed measures of science knowledge.

Item Type:	Article
Official URL:	https://journals.plos.org/plosone/
Additional Information:	© 2024 The Author(s)
Divisions:	Methodology
Subjects:	H Social Sciences Q Science
Date Deposited:	16 Jan 2024 14:12
Last Modified:	16 Feb 2024 11:54
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/121387

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