Akademik Veri Yönetim Sistemi
Turkish Studies (Elektronik), cilt.15, sa.8, ss.4009-4034, 2020 (Hakemli Dergi)
In the early 1960s, first in the USA and Britain and then in many countries, the debates initiated byscientists that the public's interest in scientific developments is gradually decreasing, the sense of trust inscientists is also weakening, which will endanger the future of the countries, has started to be influential in theworld of science and politics. When the surveys conducted at that time began to confirm these concerns, itraised the question of how to find a solution to this problem. This issue has attracted the attention of almostevery segment of society from academics to politicians. The concerns that the public is less and less interestedin the developments in science and technology, that their trust in scientists is decreasing, and that this endangersthe future of the countries, was expressed by scientists for the first time, and this problem started to be discussedin the context of science and politics. In the 1980s, some social scientists developed the "deficit model", inother words the "knowledge deficit" model, to help to solve this problem. The Knowledge Deficit model isbased on the assumptions that the public is unaware of the basic scientific facts, therefore exhibits negativeattitudes towards science and some scientific applications, they distrust scientists, and if the basic scientificfacts are taught to the public, they will develop attitudes that support science and scientific practices, and willstart to trust scientists. In this study, the Cross Ignorance approach, which examines the assumptions on whichthe Knowledge Deficit model is based, in terms of different variables is proposed. The Knowledge Deficitmodel, which asserts that there is an information gap in the public and that if this gap is filled, attitudes willdevelop in the public to support scientific developments and scientists, has not considered the possibility thatthere may be an information gap in scientists and journalists who are are expected to play an important role infilling the supposed information gap in the public. This paper proposes the Cross Ignorance approach, whichclaims to contribute to developing attitudes in the public to support science and to build trust in scientists. TheCross Ignorance approach looks at this issue from a different perspective than the Knowledge Deficit modeldoes. The Cross Ignorance approach is important in terms of proposing a different perspective to researchers,which can contribute to the elimination of the scientist-journalist conflict, and ultimately to PublicUnderstanding of Science efforts