Framing of Science and Technology

Frames are organizing ideas or story lines that provide meaning to an event. Journalists use them to package complex issues in persuasive ways by focusing on single interpretations. Social norms and values, pressures from organizations and interest groups, journalistic routines and ideological and political views of the journalists all are factors in frame creation.

Gamson and Modigliani (1989) outline 5 common framing devices (metaphors, exemplars, catchphrases, depictions, and visual images (or icons)). For every theme, there is a counter-theme. For instance, the metaphor of technological progress is countered by Pandora’s Box (runaway technology). The icon of Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Edison have Frankenstein’s monster, Thomas Huxley’s Brave New World, and Charlie Chaplin’s Modern Times. Framing devices provide social heuristics to a commonly-understood narrative or moral teaching.

Dorothy Nelkin (1995) argues that science is often cast as being distinct from politics and clashes of social values. While individual scientists can be criticized as being biased, science as an institution is cast as a neutral source of authority. Technology is often associated with the forward direction (frontiers, battles and struggles), however when described as a crisis, these “runaway forces” require reining in through government regulation.

Sheufele (Scheufele, 1999) sees framing as a continuous process, not merely an output, but also an input into the media. Journalists are also audiences. They are cognitive misers like the rest of us and are equally susceptible to the very frames that they use to describe events and issues. How the elite journalists frame an issue has an effect on how subsequent journalists approach the issue. Who sets the frame first is in a position of power.

Nisbet and Huge (2007) analyzed the way plant biotechnology was framed in the US media and reported that most stories relied on using technical frames, such as reporting on new research, economic and international competitiveness, or property rights. Only a few of the articles used dramatic frames that dealt with the ethics and morality of biotechnology, scientific uncertainty, and public engagement of the issues. Nisbet believes that the largely technical frame in the US media was responsible for plant biotech essentially being a non-issue in this country, as opposed to in Europe.

In a perspectives piece appearing in the journal Science, Nisbet and Mooney (2007) criticized scientists for believing in a public that can be persuaded by mere facts (remember the deficit model?). Instead, citizens use their “value predispositions” (political/religious beliefs) to actively engage with the news, seeking those views that reaffirm their own value-systems (psychological theory: cognitive dissonance). Nisbet and Mooney argue that scientists should avoid emphasizing the technical details of science when trying to defend it in public. In letters to the editor, many reacted negatively to this notion that scientists must “spin” their work, and that those who are trained to debate the issues represent a very small number of experts.

Common Frames in Science/Technology

Social and technological progress (“better living through chemistry”)
Economic development and competitiveness (energy independence)
Soft paths (living harmoniously with the world and its resources)
Public Accountability (Ralph Nader)
Faustian bargain (short-term trade for long-term consequences)
Consensus versus scientific controversy (global warming, intelligent design)
Playing God (stem cell research)

References

Gamson, W. A., & Modigliani, A. (1989). Media Discourse and Public Opinion on Nuclear Power: A Constructionist Approach. American Journal of Sociology, 95(1), 1-37.

Nelkin, D. (1995). Selling science : how the press covers science and technology. New York: Freeman.

Nisbet, M. C., & Huge, M. (2007). Where do Science Debates Come From? Understanding Attention Cycles and Framing. In D. Brossard, J. Shanahan & C. Nesbitt (Eds.), The Public, the Media and Agricultural Biotechnology (pp. 193-230). Cambridge, MA: CABI.

Nisbet, M. C., & Mooney, C. (2007). Framing Science. Science, 316(5821), 56-.

Scheufele, D. A. (1999). Framing as a theory of media effects. Journal of Communication, 49(1), 103-122.