Thesis (Ph.D.)--Michigan State University. Dept. of Counseling, Educational Psychology, and Special Education, 2008. / Title from PDF t.p. (viewed on July 17, 2009) Includes bibliographical references (p.150-155). Also issued in print.

Science communication, as a multidisciplinary field, serves to transfer scientific information to individuals to promote interest and awareness in science. This process resembles science education. Rooted in science education and science communication studies, this study examines the 4th and 5th grade students` usage of prominent science information sources (SIS), the features of these sources, and their effective and ineffective uses and processes in communicating science to students. Guided by situated learning and uses and gratifications (U&amp / G) theories, this study is a phenomenological qualitative inquiry. Data were gathered through approximately 64 hours of classroom observations / focus group and individual interviews from four elementary schools (two public, two private schools) in Ankara, T&uuml / rkiye. Focus group interviews were conducted with 47 students, and individual interviews were carried out with 17 teachers and 10 parents. The data were analyzed manually and MAXQDA software respectively. The results revealed that students used various SIS in school-based and beyond contexts to satisfy their cognitive, affective, personal, and social integrative needs. They used SIS for (a) science courses, (b) homework/project assignments, (c) exam/test preparations, and (d) individual science related research. Moreover, the results indicated that comprehensible, enjoyable, entertaining, interesting, credible, brief, updated, and visual aspects of content and content presentation of SIS were among the key drivers affecting students` use of SIS. The results revealed that accessibility of SIS was an important variable in students` use of these sources. Results further shed light on the connection between science education and science communication in terms of promoting science learning.

La plupart des Américains ne sont pas préoccupés par les vaccins. Cependant, minorité petite mais vocale l’est, et un nombre croissant de parents américains reçoivent des exemptions de vaccination pour leurs enfants sur la base de la religion ou de «convictions personnelles». Le refus vaccinal peut avoir des conséquences désastreuses: dans certaines communautés, la couverture vaccinale infantile a plongé bien en deçà du seuil requis pour «l'immunité collective», permettant à des maladies comme la rougeole d'opérer un retour en force. L'hésitation vaccinale et le refus vaccinal sont souvent attribués au manque de connaissances ou de compréhension des « faits » scientifiques des anti-vaccins. La plupart des interventions de santé publique qui visent à promouvoir la vaccination reposent sur la simple diffusion de connaissances scientifiques fiables; la communication scientifique est perçue comme un processus à sens unique de diffusion des connaissances scientifiques. La théorie est la suivante : si les anti-vaccins savaient à quel point les vaccins sont sécuritaires, efficaces et nécessaires, ils vaccineraient davantage. Malheureusement, la littérature dans plusieurs disciplines suggère que de telles interventions d'éducation passive à l'échelle de la communauté sont généralement inefficaces pour persuader les anti-vaccins d'adopter des attitudes et des comportements pro-vaccination. Pourquoi? En m'inspirant des principes de transdisciplinarité d'Edgar Morin, de la théorie des révolutions scientifiques de Thomas Kuhn et de la méthodologie de revue méta-narrative de Trisha Greenhalgh, j'examine les publications de différents auteurs phares de différentes disciplines qui fournissent directement ou indirectement une réponse à cette question. Je distingue trois approches principales, qui diffèrent quant à leur explication générale des raisons pour lesquelles les interventions basées sur la simple diffusion de preuves scientifiques échouent. La première explication est que les anti-vaccins n'ont pas les connaissances scientifiques nécessaires pour comprendre les preuves scientifiques qui leur sont présentées. La deuxième est que la résistance des anti-vaccins aux preuves scientifiques peut s’expliquer par de nombreux biais cognitifs qui anènent les individus à faire des erreurs systématiques de jugement et à s'écarter ainsi de l’idéal décisionnel de la théorie du choix rationnel. Le troisième narratif sur les anti-vaccins met l'accent sur les influences socioculturelles. Selon la théorie de la cognition culturelle, la culture influence les perceptions du risque à travers des biais cognitifs. Ces trois narratifs sur l'hésitation et le refus de la vaccination sont examinés en profondeur afin de fournir une synthèse interdisciplinaire des facteurs qui peuvent expliquer l'échec des interventions de santé publique basées sur l'éducation à persuader les anti-vaccins. / Most Americans are not concerned about vaccines. However, a small but vocal minority is, and a growing number of parents are receiving vaccine mandate exemptions for their children on the basis of religion or “personal belief.” Vaccine refusal can have disastrous consequences: in some communities, childhood vaccination coverage has dived well below the threshold required for “herd immunity,” allowing diseases like measles to stage a forceful comeback. Vaccine hesitancy and refusal are often attributed to a lack of knowledge or lack of understanding of scientific “facts” on the part of antivaxxers. Most public health interventions that aim to promote vaccination rely on disseminating trustworthy scientific knowledge and see science communication as a one-way process of diffusion of scientific evidence. If antivaxxers knew how safe, effective, and necessary vaccines are, the theory goes, they would vaccinate more. Unfortunately, literature across disciplines suggests that such passive, community-wide education interventions are mostly ineffective at persuading antivaxxers to adopt pro-vaccination attitudes and behaviours. Why? Inspired by Edgar Morin’s principles of transdisciplinarity, Thomas Kuhn’s theory of scientific revolutions, and Trisha Greenhalgh’s meta-narrative review methodology, I examine the publications of different seminal authors across disciplines that directly or indirectly provide an answer to this question. I distinguish three main approaches, which differ as to their general explanation of why interventions based on simple dissemination of scientific evidence fail. The first explanation is that antivaxxers lack the scientific literacy that is necessary to understand the scientific evidence that is presented to them. The second is that antivaxxers’ resistance to scientific evidence can be explained by the numerous cognitive biases and “rules of thumb” that lead individuals to make systematic errors in judgment and thus deviate from the rational choice theory decision-making ideal. The third narrative stresses sociocultural influences. According to cultural cognition theory, culture influences risk perceptions through the mechanisms of cognitive biases and heuristics. These three narratives about vaccine hesitancy and refusal are thoroughly examined in order to provide a cross-disciplinary synthesis of factors that may explain the failure of education-based public health interventions to persuade antivaxxers.