Word selection affects perceptions of synthetic biology
نویسندگان
چکیده
Members of the synthetic biology community have discussed the significance of word selection when describing synthetic biology to the general public. In particular, many leaders proposed the word "create" was laden with negative connotations. We found that word choice and framing does affect public perception of synthetic biology. In a controlled experiment, participants perceived synthetic biology more negatively when "create" was used to describe the field compared to "construct" (p = 0.008). Contrary to popular opinion among synthetic biologists, however, low religiosity individuals were more influenced negatively by the framing manipulation than high religiosity people. Our results suggest that synthetic biologists directly influence public perception of their field through avoidance of the word "create".
منابع مشابه
The Intervening Role of Tourists’ Perception in the Effect of Word of Mouth Advertisement on the Intention to Visit Religious Tourism Destinations (Case Study: Mashhad)
Objective Successful development of tourism in many tourism destinations around the world depends on how to manage tourists’ perceptions by marketing managers and tourism planners. Thus, any information source about the tourists is of high importance that can be used to affect their beliefs towards the religious destinations. Therefore, it is important to identify the formation of such percept...
متن کاملEthical Debates on Synthetic Biology
Background: As an emerging interdisciplinary area of science with a multitude of potential facilities and applications, synthetic biology integrates different disciplines with one another ranging from basic science to engineering. This interdisciplinary branch therefore encompasses sciences that require specific development and ethical approaches. Materials and Methods: Science management princ...
متن کاملA novel statistical approach identifies feedback interactions for the construction of robust stochastic transcriptional oscillators
Synthetic biology can be defined as applying engineering approaches, such as part standardisation, abstraction and mathematical modelling, to the design and engineering of novel biological systems. Engineering transcriptional networks presents many challenges including inherent uncertainty in the system structure, changing cellular context and stochasticity in the governing dynamics. One approa...
متن کاملIranian EFL High School Students’ Perceptions Regarding Written Grammar Feedback
This paper reports on a study thatinvestigated Iranian EFL high school students’ perceptions of written grammar feedback to specify their reasons for preferring comprehensive or selective feedback and choosing some feedback strategies. A questionnaire was administered to 100 EFL intermediate high school students who were selected based on their scores on a proficiency test. Moreover, semi-struc...
متن کامل