by Carol Garcia
by Carol Garcia
Science is a constant. From cooking a meal to getting a vaccine, scientific advancements have improved the daily lives of people all over the world. But how much does the average person living in the U.S. trust science? To answer this question, we must look at different demographics and time periods, specifically before and after the COVID-19 pandemic. There is indeed a range of opinions on controversial topics like climate change, which can often lead to questioning the integrity of scientific work itself. Additionally, flashy headlines such as “Can the public’s trust in science-and scientists- be restored?”, have placed the scientific community under scrutiny, which has led some Americans to distrust science in the last five years. An article about the decrease of trust in science reported that in April of 2020, 87% of Americans expressed “at least a fair amount of confidence” in scientists, whereas in a similar survey taken in November of 2024, 76% of the population believed that “scientists act in the best interest of the public”. Currently, as the scientific community reels from a flurry of executive orders and funding cuts, some scientists believe this will “erode the public trust in science” once again. In this piece, we briefly discuss trust in science during and after the COVID-19 pandemic and how this major event has impacted the public’s view of science.
The height of the COVID-19 pandemic was dynamic in its effects. Some believe that U.S. leadership downplayed the severity of the pandemic, even going as far as pausing media statements from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). As the pandemic became the most open social discussion of its kind in recent history, the U.S. had intense debates among citizens about whether the system was prepared to handle a large sick population. During this time, a portion of the population believed that the U.S. was not equipped to handle a high volume of cases. The rapid scientific development during the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic may have altered the “public perception” of scientific processes. As scientists were dealing with a rapidly evolving novel virus, 47% of the population stated they trusted the news media to “provide reliable information on coronavirus”. The pandemic caused scattering of beliefs amongst different groups due to the onslaught of ever-changing information. A study analyzing the polarization of trust in scientific expertise in 2020 found that 37% of conservative republicans reported “high levels of trust” while 87% of liberal democrats expressed the same.
In March of 2024 the National Science Board (NSB), which biennially publishes Science and Engineering Indicators for the president and congress, published their report on the state of U.S. science and engineering. This report, which detailed the effects of COVID-19 on public confidence, found that the levels of confidence were the highest in 2020, and this increased with higher education. In March of 2020, a survey outlined that “more females than males expressed trust in scientific information available on coronavirus”, with 76.7% of respondents trusting “a lot”. In the year 2021, trust was highest among older respondents identifying as white with white adults being more likely than Black adults to have high confidence in medical scientists. This latest study highlights the need to bolster proper scientific communication to minorities, including better in-person care for Black Americans as many state they “are not heard” during medical visits. Another 2023 report on public perceptions of science found that confidence in scientists in general extended more towards medical scientists, with 77% of the population stating “they have a great deal or fair amount of confidence in medical scientists to act in the public’s best interest”. In 2022, the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) continued analyzing findings about public confidence in science. They found that “many of those surveyed question the extent to which scientists share their values or overcome personal biases when presenting conclusions.” That same year, the Pew Research Center (PRC) revealed data supporting that there was a shift in the trajectory of attitudes toward medical scientists and other scientists with only 29% of U.S. adults surveyed stating they have confidence in scientists. In a report in 2023 including data from 2020, PRC had reported that 40% of adults had confidence in medical scientists and scientists. Additionally, the same report indicated that the “the public has high levels of confidence in scientists’ competence, trustworthiness, and honesty” with 84% of respondents stating that they were “very confident” or “somewhat confident.” These reports have shown us that from 2020 to 2023, the public’s trust in science has swayed from positive to negative to positive again, most recently landing us in a place where over 70% of adults surveyed have regained confidence in scientists.
Within the storm of information that took over news outlets during the pandemic, short-form content began to take more precedence. Respondents in a late 2020 PRC survey reported that they obtained their news from a digital device such as their smartphone, with 86% reporting they “often” use this device. What's more, a 2021 survey found that millennials, the most science-curious generation, are more likely to find scientific content on YouTube. The same survey stated that participants who were Gen Z reported they regularly seek content from social media apps such as TikTok. This short-form content became popular in 2013 but has since been propelled into the mainstream with platforms like TikTok in 2020 and Instagram Reels, most likely adapting to a fast-paced world and making information more accessible and digestible to the public. In accessing scientific news through short-form content, there may be information lost in translation, thus altering the perceptions of the public at this time. Further, many of these outlets have unmodulated algorithms that feed information without fact-checking, which could have contributed to massive spread of misinformation during the pandemic, leading some to distrust science altogether and causing the shifts in trust observed from 2020 to 2023.
We currently find ourselves at the beginning of the second Trump administration and a couple of years after the NAS report as the government is making real threats to cut the funding that supports research nationwide. This is happening in tandem with massive erasure of public scientific data from online resources and the firing of many federal workers. Many scientists have “expressed disappointment” while others feel “anxious and fearful”. How this moment of turmoil will shift the perception of science in the U.S. is unknown, but we can hypothesize that the negation of scientific values may change overall trust in science for the worse. Anti-intellectualism by conservative republicans is not new, however. During the George W Bush administration in the 2000s, the president made “non-scientific claims that challenged whether global warming was even real” and research shows that political polarization increased dramatically after the year 2000. In these times of uncertainty, the government seems to be belittling science in a nation that is the top performer of research and development (R&D) globally. Although recent research has reported that over 50% of the population believe science has had at least a “mostly positive effect on society”, we can surmise that rapid dismantling of scientific institutions will place research on the back burner and perhaps gradually change this perspective. It is possible that scientific engagement in general may take a dive with this new administration, placing us in a country where science’s role is seen as tertiary.
Despite this, scientists are working every day to combat the shifting tides, staying faithful to scientific values and trying to minimize the impact of swift changes as much as possible. More recently, scientists all over the country have organized and mobilized for their right to maintain their funding and remind the public of the importance of their everyday work. In the past, present and future, efforts like the nationwide “Stand Up For Science” rallies from hard-working scientists have shaped the world into one of efficiency and health. While we are at a crossroads, it is important to remind ourselves how far we have come in our scientific advancements and how much trust we have placed in scientists, and further, how much trust we have in each other. The United States ranks highly among nations that value scientific inquiry, and we will continue to fight for these values.