National project · Science communication
¿Qué es la ciencia para ti?
A CIEMAT public survey on how people see science and technology
About the project
¿Qué es la ciencia para ti? (‘What does science mean to you?’) was the participation campaign of the PICA project (Perception, Interest, Knowledge and Actions), through which the Scientific Culture Research Unit (UICC) at CIEMAT studied how the public sees science and technology.
The UICC had been working on PICA since 2014. The project started from the idea that the image of science is shaped, at least in part, by the interaction between how people perceive it, their interest in the subject, their knowledge and their willingness to take actions that bring science into everyday decisions.
Participants answered the PICA questionnaire online and anonymously. It took about 40 minutes and had two parts: one to build a detailed picture and another to test hypotheses about the factors that shape it. The deadline to complete it was 31 May 2017.
Project objectives
To analyse scientific culture and the factors that influence it, taking into account the public’s point of view, which previous studies had not captured well enough.
Among the results of this second phase, the team found that knowledge helps to explain interest in science, rather than the other way round, although each reinforces the other.
The role of Ibercivis
Ibercivis shared the survey with the public. The results were published in November 2018 in the citizen science section of Heraldo de Aragón’s Tercer Milenio supplement, produced in collaboration with the Observatory of Citizen Science in Spain, coordinated by Ibercivis.
Project details
Type of project
National
Duration
2017
Funding
FECYT (project ‘Conciencia científica: traducción de la percepción en acción’ [Scientific awareness: turning perception into action], FCT-13-6532)
Consortium
CIEMAT Scientific Culture Research Unit
Area
Science communication