Science
Volume 375| Issue 6582| 18 Feb 2022
https://www.science.org/toc/science/current

Editorial
Empower with evidence
Susan G. Amara
[Excerpt]
This week (17 to 20 February), the virtual annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS, the publisher of Science) will address the challenges of building the public’s trust and understanding of science by illuminating both great science and innovative initiatives in advocacy, education, and policy. The theme, “Empower with Evidence,” speaks to the critical importance of decision-making, policy-making, and interventions that are grounded in knowledge and facts, not opinions—or worse, misinformation.
The ability of science to transform the world is increasingly threatened by misinformation that is jeopardizing trust in science. As highlighted in Science last week, the world’s information ecosystem is rapidly changing, and online environments have become a powerful open marketplace of facts, ideas, and opinions—where the meaningfulness of science is easily drowned out by the noise.
Solutions to this dilemma include training students and professional scientists to more effectively translate their work to the public, harnessing insights from the behavioral and social sciences to better engage with the public, and working with social media platforms to improve information delivery to a broader audience. These are important efforts, but do they get to the root of the problem?…