With or Without Scientists

The media was the source of most of the new scientific information acquired by European citizens in the late twentieth century. During those years, television, magazines and newspapers were key elements in the public awareness of scientific discoveries, and in the process by which new knowledge became ‘common sense’ for certain social groups. ² In a parallel process, science in the media became an increasingly more important subject of scholarly work. From Media Studies to Social Psychology, Science and Technology Studies, Sociology and History of Science, numerous scholars have studied a wide variety of aspects of the relationship between science and its publics. ³