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Geoengineering And The Science Communication Environment: A Cross-Cultural Experiment, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan, Hank C. Jenkins-Smith, Tor Tarantola, Carol L. Silva
Geoengineering And The Science Communication Environment: A Cross-Cultural Experiment, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan, Hank C. Jenkins-Smith, Tor Tarantola, Carol L. Silva
GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works
We conducted a two-nation study (United States, n = 1500; England, n = 1500) to test a novel theory of science communication. The cultural cognition thesis posits that individuals make extensive reliance on cultural meanings in forming perceptions of risk. The logic of the cultural cognition thesis suggests the potential value of a distinctive two-channel science communication strategy that combines information content (“Channel 1”) with cultural meanings (“Channel 2”) selected to promote open-minded assessment of information across diverse communities. In the study, scientific information content on climate change was held constant while the cultural meaning of that information was experimentally …
Risk And Culture: Is Synthetic Biology Different?, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan, Gregory N. Mandel
Risk And Culture: Is Synthetic Biology Different?, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan, Gregory N. Mandel
GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works
Cultural cognition refers to the influence that individuals' values have on their perceptions of technological risk. We conducted a study to assess the cultural cognition of synthetic biology risks. Examining the attitudes of a large and diverse sample of Americans (N = 1,500), we found that hierarchical, conservative, and highly religious individuals - persons who normally are most skeptical of claims of environmental risks (including those relating to nuclear power and global warming) - are the persons most concerned about synthetic biology risks. We attribute this inversion of the normal cultural profile of risk perceptions to the seemingly anti-religious connotations …
Whose Eyes Are You Going To Believe? Scott V. Harris And The Perils Of Cognitive Illiberalism, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan, David A. Hoffman
Whose Eyes Are You Going To Believe? Scott V. Harris And The Perils Of Cognitive Illiberalism, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan, David A. Hoffman
GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works
This paper accepts the unusual invitation to see for yourself issued by the Supreme Court in Scott v. Harris, 127 S. Ct. 1769 (2007). Scott held that a police officer did not violate the Fourth Amendment when he deliberately rammed his car into that of a fleeing motorist who refused to pull over for speeding and instead attempted to evade the police in a high-speed chase. The majority did not attempt to rebut the arguments of the single Justice who disagreed with its conclusion that no reasonable juror could find the fleeing driver did not pose a deadly risk to …
Cultural Cognition Of The Risks And Benefits Of Nanotechnology, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan, Paul Slovic, John Gastil, Geoffrey L. Cohen
Cultural Cognition Of The Risks And Benefits Of Nanotechnology, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan, Paul Slovic, John Gastil, Geoffrey L. Cohen
GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works
We conducted an experimental public opinion study of the effect of balanced information on nanotechnology risk-benefit perceptions. The study found that subjects did not react in a uniform, much less a uniformly positive manner, but rather polarized along lines consistent with cultural predispositions toward technological risk generally.
Biased Assimilation, Polarization, And Cultural Credibility: An Experimental Study Of Nanotechnology Risk Perceptions, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan, Paul Slovic, John Gastil, Geoffrey L. Cohen, Douglass A. Kysar
Biased Assimilation, Polarization, And Cultural Credibility: An Experimental Study Of Nanotechnology Risk Perceptions, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan, Paul Slovic, John Gastil, Geoffrey L. Cohen, Douglass A. Kysar
GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works
We present the results from the second in a series of ongoing experimental studies of public perceptions of nanotechnology risks. Like the first study, the current one found that members of the public, most of whom know little or nothing about nanotechnology, polarize along cultural lines when exposed to information about it. Extending previous results, the current study also found that cultural polarization of this sort interacts with the perceived cultural identities of policy advocates. Polarization along expected lines grew even more extreme when subjects of diverse cultural outlooks observed an advocate whose values they share advancing an argument they …
The Future Of Nanotechnology Risk Perceptions: An Experimental Investigation Of Two Hypotheses, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan, Paul Slovic, John Gastil, Geoffrey L. Cohen
The Future Of Nanotechnology Risk Perceptions: An Experimental Investigation Of Two Hypotheses, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan, Paul Slovic, John Gastil, Geoffrey L. Cohen
GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works
This paper reports the results of an experiment designed to test competing conjectures about the evolution of public attitudes toward nanotechnology. The rational enlightenment hypothesis holds that members of the public will become favorably disposed to nanotechnology as balanced and accurate information about it disseminates. The cultural cognition hypothesis, in contrast, holds that members of the public are likely to polarize along cultural lines when exposed to such information. Using a between-subjects design (N = 1,862), the experiment compared the perceptions of subjects exposed to balanced information on the risks and benefits of nanotechnology to the perceptions of subjects exposed …
Culture And Identity-Protective Cognition: Explaining The White Male Effect In Risk Perception, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan, John Gastil, Paul Slovic, C.K. Mertz200
Culture And Identity-Protective Cognition: Explaining The White Male Effect In Risk Perception, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan, John Gastil, Paul Slovic, C.K. Mertz200
GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works
Why do white men fear various risks less than women and minorities? Known as the white male effect, this pattern is well documented but poorly understood. This paper proposes a new explanation: identity-protective cognition. Putting work on the cultural theory of risk together with work on motivated cognition in social psychology suggests that individuals selectively credit and dismiss asserted dangers in a manner supportive of their preferred form of social organization. This dynamic, it is hypothesized, drives the white male effect, which reflects the risk skepticism that hierarchical and individualistic white males display when activities integral to their cultural identities …
The Second National Risk And Culture Study: Making Sense Of - And Making Progress In - The American Culture War Of Fact, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan, Paul Slovic, John Gastil, Geoffrey L. Cohen
The Second National Risk And Culture Study: Making Sense Of - And Making Progress In - The American Culture War Of Fact, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan, Paul Slovic, John Gastil, Geoffrey L. Cohen
GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works
Cultural Cognition refers to the disposition to conform one's beliefs about societal risks to one's preferences for how society should be organized. Based on surveys and experiments involving some 5,000 Americans, the Second National Risk and Culture Study presents empirical evidence of the effect of this dynamic in generating conflict about global warming, school shootings, domestic terrorism, nanotechnology, and the mandatory vaccination of school-age girls against HPV, among other issues. The Study also presents evidence of risk-communication strategies that counteract cultural cognition. Because nuclear power affirms rather than threatens the identity of persons who hold individualist values, for example, proposing …
Overcoming The Fear Of Guns, The Fear Of Gun Control, And The Fear Of Cultural Politics: Constructing A Better Gun Debate, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan
Overcoming The Fear Of Guns, The Fear Of Gun Control, And The Fear Of Cultural Politics: Constructing A Better Gun Debate, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan
GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works
The question of how strictly to regulate firearms has convulsed the national polity for the better part of four decades, and in this article Donald Braman and Dan M. Kahan conclude that the best way to engender productive debate is to investigate deeper than the statistics and address the competing American social attitudes on guns themselves: guns symbolizing honor, human mastery over nature, and individual self-sufficiency on the one hand, and guns creating the perpetuation of illicit social hierarchies, the elevation of force over reason, and the expression of collective indifference to the well-being of strangers on the other. Braman …
Caught In The Crossfire: A Defense Of The Cultural Theory Of Gun-Risk Perceptions, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan
Caught In The Crossfire: A Defense Of The Cultural Theory Of Gun-Risk Perceptions, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan
GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works
In this article, Dan Kahan and Donald Braman expand upon the cultural theory of gun-risk perception and respond to the commentaries on their previous article, More Statistics, Less Persuasion: A Cultural Theory of Gun-Risk Perceptions, 151 U. Pa. L. Rev. 1291 (2003). Their critics argue that the authors are too quick to dismiss the power of empirical information to influence individuals’ positions on gun control. But in analyzing the variety of their critics’ arguments, Kahan and Braman note the strange pattern of opinions that has emerged on the relative importance of culture and data in the gun debate. What could …