We report a study of the reception by adults of science programmes broadcast on French television. Long, semi-directive interviews were carried out during which a number of short fragments of the programmes were shown. This research, which is part of a wider study (including children, scientists and professionals involved in the production of such programmes), shows that there are not one but several, very different, readings of science programmes. That implies that, from the point of view of the public, there is no unique, `ideal' form for a science programme and that, indeed, the term `popularization of science' can have several very different meanings.
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For brevity, we sometimes `personify' the attitude. It must be remembered though that a given person could have different attitudes to other objects, that we are describing readings of a set television texts, not people.
18.
The interviewee was right: the sequence in the PET camera was pre-taped and presented as though it were live, with the reporter in the hospital `answering' François de Closets. No-one else made the remark.
19.
French and, we believe, international reporters were taken in by a false massacre in Timisoara.
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Si `le discours des scientifiques s'éloigne', il doit `ramener le débat'.
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Science et Vie Junior is the version for children (from about age 10 upwards) of Science et Vie, a popular science magazine.
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de Cheveigné, S. , and Véron, E., 1994, The Nobel on first page: the Nobel physics prizes in French newspapers. Public Understanding of Science, 3, 135.
