How do ordinary people understand scientific information?

Research on the microbiome carried out by social psychologists, Ida Galli and Roberto Fasanelli, involved in the University Federico II Task Force for Microbiome Studies(www.tfm.unina.it) analyzed those particular psychosocial processes that operate in the transformation of scientific information into common-sense knowledge (understood as predictive grids of behavior), starting from the analysis of the cognitive-affective modalities, through which people relate to a new, disturbing event related to specific scientific knowledge. The results obtained were published by a leading scientific journal in the field.

"I believe that the meaning and importance of the microbiome for humans is still not completely clear, especially in the Italian social context. Understanding how individuals process information on the subject can have very important implications both from an exquisitely social point of view and in the perspective of recruiting subjects for clinical trials that have the microbiome among the targets of intervention or observation" - the comment of Professor Danilo Ercolini, Scientific Head of the University Task Force on the Microbiome.

Despite the proliferation of publications on the topic, the international literature lacks exquisitely psychosocial contributions on the cognitive-affective implications associated with knowledge of the human microbiome. In other words, there are no studies devoted to the co-constructed representations circulating in our society related to this very important object of inquiry. It is therefore about that particular mode of social knowledge construction that Serge Moscovici has called Social Representations. Social knowledge, in his view, is constructed from two distinct resources: conceptions that we accept as true, without having had any direct experience of them, or conceptions totally originating from our direct experience. However, we know that "second-hand," socially mediated knowledge is necessary to clarify certain concepts or ideas for us. It is precisely this kind of knowledge that people resort to when they ask questions such as: Are vaccines really helpful or harmful? Are climate variations "divine punishment," or the consequence of irresponsible human behavior? Are genetically modified organisms (GMOs) to be considered the greatest eugenic experiment in our history, or simply a useful method to save some plants from extinction? Was Covid-19 created in a Chinese laboratory, or is it the natural evolution of a zoonotic virus transmitted by a wild animal?

Microbiome research challenges established beliefs and dogmas, opening up one of the most promising study scenarios in recent decades, as the numerous references in the literature clearly demonstrate. Much of these investigations have focused exclusively on individual health, paying little attention to the implications that accumulated knowledge has for public health, or for their consequences for human behavior. Beginning with the study of the ethical, legal and social dimensions, of human microbiome research some researchers have shown perspectives related to its translation into collective practices, focusing particularly on the implications for health promotion.

Publication: Galli, I., & Fasanelli, R. (2020) Public Understanding of Science and Common Sense: Social representations of the human microbiome among the expert and non-expert public. Health Psychology Open. 7(1), 1-14. https://doi. org/10.1177/205510292091323