Some say there’s a global crisis of trust — but research reveals where the real problems lie.
Why we don’t really know what the public thinks about science
Measuring trust isn’t enough. Furthering knowledge about the institutions and norms of science is the best way to build credibility.
Science has been in a “replication crisis” for a decade. Have we learned anything?
Bad papers are still published. But some other things might be getting better.
A Data Utopia for Science-of-Science
Here I want to briefly sketch out a vision for how to solve a key set of problems facing science-of-science researchers, using the relatively new idea of a ‘data trust.’ In my ideal wor…
Sciences perceived as precise and consensual are more trusted
Research focused on the United States shows that people’s trust in science varies considerably between disciplines. Existing explanations of these trust gaps stress the role of ideology: when people perceive scientists of a particular discipline to be ideologically like-minded, they tend to trust them more. Here, we report two findings: first, trust gaps between disciplines also exist in France—a representative sample of the French population (N = 1012) trusted researchers in biology and physics more than researchers studying climate science, economics, or sociology. Second, the more precise and consensual participants perceive scientific findings to be, the more they tend to trust the scientists (across and within disciplines). While these findings are correlational, they align with a non-ideological explanation of trust in science: the rational impression account. This account proposes that people can come to trust scientists by relying on basic cognitive inference processes, which tend to be generally rational.
Can we measure trust in scientific publications? - LSE Impact
Jonathon Alexis Coates outlines how a constellation of static and dynamic indicators could provide a means for assessing the trustworthiness of published research
Why Should I Trust You?
News Commentary Podcast · Updated Weekly · Bold, unfiltered, and uncompromisingly honest, Why Should I Trust You? is a weekly podcast that looks at the breakdown in trust for science and public health. It drops every Thursday, with occasional…
Guest Post — Restoring Trust in Science: What Would Make a Difference? - The Scholarly Kitchen
Today's guest post asserts that trust won’t be restored by "better messaging" alone, but via better incentives, more disciplined public communication, and really listening to the people who have walked away from us.
The Current Crisis: What's Happening to Science in America
Research ethics: 3 ways to blow the whistle
Reporting suspicions of scientific fraud is rarely easy, but some paths are more effective than others.
Half of social-science studies fail replication test in years-long project
Results from massive, ‘eagerly awaited’ initiative reinforce concerns about the credibility of science — but raise hope for solutions.
Why I don’t trust most human-AI interaction experimental research – Jason Collins blog
Behavioural economics, data science and artificial intelligence.
Science Must Decentralize
Knowledge production doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Every great scientific breakthrough is built on prior work, and an ongoing exchange with peers in the field. That’s why we need to address the threat
What stories should we tell about scientific progress now?
In search of the mysterious fruits of basic science
Why do people trust physicists and biologists more than economists or sociologists? In a new paper out in Public Understanding of Science, @hugoreasoning.bsky.social and I argue that it has to do with perceived precision and consensus. doi.org/10.1177/09636625261471051
Sciences perceived as precise and consensual are more trusted - Jan Pfänder, Hugo Mercier, 2026
doi.orgNew study finds that when people help collect data or contribute to research it can build public trust by making scientists feel personally familiar and approachable, and that trust then spreads to how local and tangible the research feels. jcom.sissa.it/article/pubid/JCOM_2506_2026_…
How can citizen science reduce psychological distance to science? Insights from three projects in contested environmental contexts
jcom.sissa.itI am disappointed by the fact that so many seem tempted to share a "nonrigorous", unserious attempt at quantifying fraud in science because it passes some silly vibe check ("I asked others and they agree"). So in the name of good science, we're ready to produce bad science as a rhetorical tool.
