Science on the mind: Examining question ordering effects when asking about science on large-scale surveys

Abstract

Previous research has examined people’s attitudes toward science and scientists, highlighting how religious identities, beliefs, or behavior shapes these attitudes. However, survey design choices have been previously shown to influence individuals’ attitudes toward religion and science. We investigated the extent to which question ordering (i.e. presenting questions about science before questions about religion or the paranormal) in a large-scale survey would influence respondents’ attitudes toward science and religion. Utilizing an experimental design, we found that responding to science questions first led to (1) more interest in science, (2) more confidence in the scientific community, (3) increased agreement that science is a way of knowing truth, (4) more confidence in responding to science knowledge items, (5) more agreement to scientific statements, and (6) more trust in scientists. We discuss the implications of question ordering when analyzing attitudes toward science and religion within the same surveys and future directions for research.

Keywords

attitudes toward science attitudes toward scientists large-scale surveys question ordering science and religion

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

AmeriSpeak (n.d.). Available at: https://amerispeak.norc.org/

Baker

(2012) Public perceptions of incompatibility between “science and religion”. Public Understanding of Science 21: 340–353.

Davern

Bautista

Freese

Herd

Morgan

(2023) General social survey 1972–2022. Machine-Readable Data File, 7 July. Available at: https://sda.berkeley.edu/sdaweb/docs/gss22rel2/DOC/GSS2022Release2Codebook.pdf

Ecklund

Johnson

Vaidyanathan

Matthews

KRW

Lewis

Thomson

(2019) Secularity and Science: What Scientists around the World Really Think About Religion. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Elsdon-Baker

(2015) Creating creationists: The influence of “issues framing” on our understanding of public perceptions of clash narratives between evolutionary science and belief. Public Understanding of Science 24(4): 422–439.

Elsdon-Baker

(2020) Creating hardline “secular” evolutionists: The influence of question design on our understanding of public perceptions of clash narratives between evolutionary science and belief. In: Elsdon-Baker

Lightman

(eds) Identity in a Secular Age. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh, pp. 30–49.

Evans

(2018) Morals Not Knowledge: Recasting the Contemporary U.S. Conflict Between Religion and Science. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.

Funk

(2019) How highly religious Americans view evolution depends on how they’re asked about it, 6 February. Available at: https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/02/06/how-highly-religious-americans-view-evolution-depends-on-how-theyre-asked-about-it/

Haddock

Carrick

(1999) “The Queen Mother and I”: Assimilation, contrast, and attitudes toward social groups. European Journal of Social Psychology 29(1): 123–129.

10.

Hill

(2019) Survey-based research on science and religion: A review and critique. In: Jones

Kaden

Catto

(eds) Science, Belief, and Society: International Perspectives on Religion, Non-Religion, and the Public Understanding of Science. Bristol: Bristol University Press, pp. 25–53.

11.

Leicht

Sharp

LaBouff

, et al. (2022) Content matters: Perceptions of the science-religion relationship. The International Journal for the Psychology of Religion 32(3): 232–255.

12.

McPhetres

Jong

Zuckerman

(2021) Religious Americans have less positive attitudes toward science, but this does not extend to other cultures. Social Psychological and Personality Science 12(4): 528–536.

13.

Rios

Aveyard

(2019) Science-religion compatibility beliefs across Middle Eastern and American young adult samples: The role of cross-cultural exposure. Public Understanding of Science 28(8): 949–957.

14.

Sherkat

(2011) Religion and scientific literacy in the United States. Social Science Quarterly 92(5): 1134–1150.

15.

Simpson

Rios

(2019) Is science for atheists? Perceived threat to religious cultural authority explains US Christians’ distrust in secularized science. Public Understanding of Science 28(7): 740–758.