Enhancing the Broader Impacts of Developing a Social-Cognitive, Multilevel, Empirically-Based Model of Public Engagement for the Shaping of Science and Innovation Policy

新兴科技(S和技术)创新可能引发公众争议，并发出信号，表明有机会通过相互竞争的公共价值观、理解和误解来决定如何协调公共价值观与新的S；T。国会(21世纪纳米技术研究和发展法案，2003年)和白宫科技政策办公室(2010年4月7日，开放政府计划)建议处理这一复杂任务的一种方式是与公众就与科技创新相关的伦理、法律和社会问题进行接触。目前，使用了广泛的公共参与技术--包括焦点小组、公共论坛和讨论、调查和社会营销。不同形式的公众参与涉及旨在唤起有意义的公众意见的不同特征。然而，关于哪些公共参与选择在不同条件下是有效的，人们知之甚少。关于科学或技术创新的信息应该如何传达？对参与者来说，单独接触信息还是分组接触信息更好？可以也应该鼓励参与者批判性地思考所提供的信息吗？这个项目试图通过将心理学和其他社会科学的洞察力应用于关于复杂的、前沿的纳米技术问题的多个模拟和受控(即实验室)“公共”活动来开始回答这些问题。研究人员从这些订婚活动中收集了大量信息。对参与数据的分析将使研究人员、政策制定者和公众能够更好地了解不同公共参与方法的优势和局限性，并建立对此类参与的新见解。该项目将发布一组四项独特的纵向研究的数据和结果。研究跨越三到四周的时间跨度进行，涉及1200多名学生参与者。在每项研究中，参与的不同社会和认知方面都被实验性地操纵，以评估它们对共同的公共参与目标的影响。例如，研究改变了关于新技术的信息的设计，以及参与者是单独还是以小组的形式考虑与技术相关的伦理、法律和社会问题。审查了这些操纵对获得的纳米技术知识、对纳米技术发展和监管的态度和看法、对纳米科学家和管理纳米技术的政策制定者的信任以及对政策结果的接受的影响。目前的项目将广泛传播每项研究的结果，并通过提供操纵设计特征的详细说明和补充材料，包括研究数据、研究材料、仪器以及多种格式的数据转换和分析语法，方便公众获取。这些材料将促进其他研究人员使用不同的理论观点进行进一步分析，并允许在纳米技术以外的主题上进行理论发展。

Emerging science and technology (S&T) innovations can trigger public controversies and signal the opportunity to work through competing public values, understandings, and misunderstandings to decide how to reconcile public values with new S&T. One way that Congress (21st Century Nanotechnology Research and Development Act , 2003) and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (Open Government Plan, April 7, 2010) have suggested to approach this complicated task is to engage with the public about the ethical, legal, and social issues related to scientific and technological innovations. Currently, a wide range of public engagement techniques are used-including focus groups, public forums and deliberations, surveys, and social marketing. Different forms of public engagement involve different features designed to evoke meaningful public input. However, little is known regarding which public engagement options are effective under different conditions. How should information about scientific or technological innovations be conveyed? Is it better for participants to engage with information individually or in groups? Can and should participants be encouraged to think critically about the information presented? This project seeks to begin to answer these questions by applying insights from psychology and other social sciences to multiple simulated and controlled (that is, laboratory) "public" engagements about complex, cutting-edge, nanotechnology issues. The researchers collected substantial information from these engagement events. The analyses of the data from the engagements will enable researchers, policymakers, and the public to better understand the strengths and limitations of different approaches to public engagements and to build new insights about such engagements. This project will disseminate data and results from a set of four unique longitudinal studies. Studies were conducted across three- to four-week timespans, and involved more than 1,200 student participants. In each study, different social and cognitive aspects of engagement were experimentally manipulated to assess their impacts on common public-engagement goals. For example, studies varied the design of information about new technologies, and whether participants considered technology-relevant ethical, legal, and social issues individually or in groups. Effects of these manipulations were examined on knowledge acquired about nanotechnology, attitudes toward and perceptions of the development and regulation of nanotechnology, trust in nanoscientists and the policymakers who deal with regulating nanotechnology, and acceptance of policy outcomes. The current project will broadly disseminate each study's findings, as well as facilitate public access by providing detailed descriptions of the manipulated design features and supplementary materials that include the data from the studies, study materials, instruments, and data transformation and analysis syntax in multiple formats. These materials will foster further analyses by other researchers using alternative theoretical perspectives and allow theoretical development on topics beyond nanotechnology.