A Metacognitive Perspective on Politicized Science 

Speaker: Helen Fischer
Leibniz Institute for Knowledge Media, Germany

May 18, 2022
11:15 AM - 1:00 PM U.S. Eastern Time 

Abstract
In the area of politicized science such as climate change or COVID-19, citizens are confronted with noisy information environments that mix the “signal”, scientifically accurate information, with a high proportion of “noise”, information that is misleading, de-contextualized, or outright false. Consequently, the reliability of any given piece of information (in terms of its truth value) is low. In this talk, I will present a series of studies that use methods from Signal Detection Theory (SDT) and metacognition to explore the questions: How well can citizens distinguish true from false statements about politicized science? How do noisy information environments affect metacognitive insight, the accuracy with which citizens can indicate what they do, and do not know about politicized science? How does metacognitive insight relate to beliefs and behavior in relation to politicized science, how to polarization? Key findings from this research include that citizens are metacognitively confused about what they do, and do not know about the politicized domains of climate change and COVID-19, and more so than about non-politicized science. This may suggest that the level of informational noise is higher for politicized, compared to non-politicized science. Furthermore, metacognitive insight can hep explain beliefs and behavior in relation to politicized science, above and beyond object-level accuracy such as the accuracy of knowledge. The present research highlights that the danger of noisy information environments may not only lie in them reducing object-level accuracy; rather, the danger may also lie in them reducing the accuracy of metacognitive insight. 

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