A correspondent writes:
I enjoyed your recent talk at Cornell University. I was especially interested by your data that showed the more you know about climate change, the less you believe in it (if you are on the political right). Do you have any similar data that shows how information about GMOS shapes opinion based on political identifiers?
Would love to explore any studies you may have on GMOs
My response:
I wish!
On this topic, I’ve done nothing more than collect some data showing that there are no political divisions over — or any other interesting sources of systematic variation in — the attitudes of general public toward GMOs. E.g.,
- MAPKIA! Episode 31 “Answer”: culturally programmed risk predispositions alert to “fracking” but say “enh” (pretty much) to GM foods
- Who fears what & why? Trust but verify!
- We aren’t polarized on GM foods– no matter what the result in Washington state
Consider this (from nationally rep sample of 1500+ in summer 2013):
There’s lots of research, though, showing that the vast majority of the public doesn’t know anything of consequence about GM foods, a finding that, given efforts to rile them up, suggests a pretty ingrained lack of interest:
American consumers’ knowledge and awareness of GM foods are low. More than half (54%) say they know very little or nothing at all about genetically modified foods, and one in four (25%) say they have never heard of them.
Before introducing the idea of GM foods, the survey participants were asked simply ”What information would you like to see on food labels that is not already on there?” In response, most said that no additional information was needed on food labels. Only 7% of respondents raised GM food labeling on their own. . . .
Only about a quarter (26%) of Americans realize that current regulations do not require GM products to be labeled.
Hallman, W., Cuite, C. & Morin, X. Public Perceptions of Labeling Genetically Modified Foods. Rutgers School of Environ. Sci. Working Paper 2013-2001.
You should also a look at this guest CCP post by Jason Delbourne, who you might also want to contact, who discusses the invalidity of drawing inferences about public opinion from opinion surveys under such circumstances.
One additional thing:
As you imply, our research group has found that science literacy in general & climate science literacy specifically both increase polarization; they don’t have any meaningful general effect in inducing “less belief” in general — their effect is big, but depends on “what sort of person” one is. Relevant papers are Kahan, D. M., Peters, E., Wittlin, M., Slovic, P., Ouellette, L. L., Braman, D., & Mandel, G. (2012). The polarizing impact of science literacy and numeracy on perceived climate change risks. Nature Climate Change, 2, 732-735 & Climate Science Communication and the Measurement Problem, Advances Pol. Psych. (in press).
On “science literacy” generally, consider:
On GM foods, data I’ve collected shows that partisans become mildly less concerned w/ GM food risks as their science comprehension (or science literacy or however one wants to refer to it) increases: