Brief description
The increasing spread of a public culture that has withdrawn trust on science and technology is alarming. This phenomenon is largely driven by the building of belief and public opinions relied on inaccurate information distributed and amplified by the media. One way of mitigating this trend is to improve science communication between science and society by initiating dialogues on science, medicine, and biotechnology.
This project, which is financed by the Toyota Foundation and the Sumitomo Foundation, will draw a programme to train both scientists and non-scientists to become science communicators at public deliberation initiatives. Both desk-top and empirical research will be conducted in order to accumulate data that may illuminate the present problems of science communication using genetically modified food as a case.
This project is a comparative study in an international context, in which the commonality and differences of the problems will be analysed in conjunction with the country’s particular contexts. It uses Japan and Germany as case study countries. It is also a study of highly practical nature in that the effectiveness of the developed programme will be tested at actual deliberation initiatives in both countries.