majority (54 and 57 percent) believed that they 

 have done more good than harm. 2 



The pace of change produced by science and 

 technology was viewed as "about right" by 

 some 50 percent of the public in both years, 

 while approximately 20 percent considered the 

 pace "too fast". About half thought that science 

 and technology will eventually solve some of 

 our problems. In 1972, 30 percent thought that 

 they will solve most of our problems; in 1974, 

 this figure dropped to 23 percent. However, on 

 the whole, these figures seem to show that the 

 public's attitudes toward science and 

 technology are favorable. 



Some results were less favorable. For exam- 

 ple, although almost half of the respondents felt 

 that the degree of control that society has over 

 science and technology should remain as it is 

 now, 28 percent wished control to be increased. 

 (Only 7 or 8 percent wanted it decreased.) 

 Slightly more than half of the respondents 

 thought that science and technology have 

 caused at least some of our problems. Thus 

 there seems to be some perception of possible 

 dangers from science and technology and 

 therefore of a need to control them. 



Of all the good things that science and 

 technology have done, in the minds of the 

 public, "medical advances" by far lead the list. 

 "Improving health care" is also the leading area 

 in which the public would like to see their taxes 

 spent for science and technology. The other 

 leading areas are equally practical. "Discover- 

 ing new basic knowledge about man and 

 nature" is far down on the list along with "space 

 exploration." This would suggest that the 

 public is not strongly interested in supporting 

 research that is not intended to have practical 

 results. 



Attitudes toward science and technology 



were more favorable among the more highly 

 educated of the population sample and those 

 with higher incomes. The young respondents 

 (18-29 years of age) gave answers similar to 

 those of the total sample. They rated "scien- 

 tists" significantly higher in prestige than did 

 the total sample, but a somewhat larger 

 percentage of them felt that science and 

 technology have caused some of our problems. 



These and the other results of the Science 

 Indicators surveys are quite valuable, but they 

 still leave important questions unanswered. For 

 one thing, they consider science and technology 

 together, whereas it would be very interesting 

 to know whether the public regards the two 

 differently. Again, the public's evaluation of 

 science and technology needs to be related to its 

 awareness and understanding of them. An 

 important distinction must also be made 

 between science (or technology) itself and those 

 who practice it. The public may not have the 

 same attitude toward both. Science Indicators 

 did not fully explore this distinction. Finally, if 

 one is considering public attitudes, one must 

 ask which public. The total public can be 

 divided into many subpublics. In Part I of this 

 chapter some respondents suggested that public 

 attitudes influence attitudes and actions of 

 government. To understand this argument it is 

 important to distinguish various publics that 

 may impinge on government differently. 

 Science Indicators made some important 

 demographic breakdowns, but left much more 

 to be done. 



For these reasons, the rest of this chapter will 

 explore other studies, both earlier and later than 

 Science Indicators. In some cases, these can 

 usefully be compared with the Science In- 

 dicators data. 



2 Although these two questions are quite similar, their 

 numerical responses are different. The reason for this is not 

 clear. However, in both cases the number of those who said 

 that science and technology are predominantly harmful was 

 quite small. 



FUNKHOUSER 



A major effort to synthesize survey data on 

 this subject appeared in a paper "Public 

 Understanding of Science: the Data We Have," 



CONFIDENCE IN SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY 83 



