CONCISE

The H2020-SwafS project ‘Communication role on perception and beliefs of EU Citizens about Science’ (CONCISE) aims to generate a European-wide debate on science communication, involving a wide array of stakeholders, from media outlets to policy makers, from scientists to business companies, from science communicators to civil society organisations.

CONCISE main objective is to provide qualitative knowledge through citizen consultation on the means/channels (media and social networks, life experience, the opinion of relatives, the influence of religion, political views, ideology, educational system…), by which EU citizens acquire their science-related science knowledge, and how this knowledge influences their beliefs, opinions, and perceptions. For this purpose, CONCISE will explore the understanding of 500 citizens (representing the 500 million EU citizens), regarding four selected topics: vaccines, complementary and alternative medicine use (CAM), genetically modified organism (GMO), and climate change.

CONCISE will carry out a citizen consultation in five countries: Lisbon (Portugal), Valencia (Spain), Vicenza (Italy), Trnava (Slovakia) and Lodz (Poland), with the participation of 100 citizens in each country (selected volunteers and representatives of different social groups, considering gender, age, educational level, ethnic minorities, impaired people, and professional careers). Their understanding and position on these four scientific topics will be evaluated, validated, compared and analysed, in order to publish the results in open access by the CONSORTIUM team. Citizen opinions will be recorded; transcribed and analysed with a linguistic corpus software in order to get different indicators that will help all stakeholders to have a more direct and fruitful communication, avoiding the danger of discourses that generate distrust and misunderstandings among citizens. CONCISE results will be scalable and its methodology could be applied to other European countries in order to increase the communication of science in terms of quality and quantity all over Europe