Interest and Engagement
Science
The word ‘science’ takes on a broad range of meanings across the population but
can be quite narrowly defined by individuals. For example, one participant in the
focus groups claimed initially to be completely uninterested in ‘science’ – which
he saw as being represented by men in white lab coats – but it later turned out
that he was greatly interested by new discoveries in astronomy, and that having
had his interest piqued by a television documentary he had recently engaged with
a number of blogs and websites concerning the discovery of new planets in distant
solar systems. The qualitative research – in which we had no participants with post-graduate
science education and only a small fraction with science related bachelor’s degrees
– showed that interest in science is often very topic dependant, with most people
able to name an aspect of scientific endeavour that they find interesting, when
probed.
The qualitative research indicated that males often felt more comfortable contributing
to the focus group discussions about science and in general had
greater levels of enthusiasm for scientific topics. The focus groups of over 45s
also showed greater interest in the conversation than the under 45s, and the groups
with higher levels of education also tended to be more interested. It was fairly
clear from the focus groups that younger females were the demographic least interested
in science. The young women in Bendigo were particularly disengaged – this was a
group with no post-secondary education, and most of them had memories of only being
bored during science class at school.
The qualitative research encountered one group (younger, Bendigo) with a particularly
low level of interest in science. This particular group had no post-secondary education;
scientific topics tended to remind them of school, where they had met with uninspiring
science education – a possible cause for their lack of interest. They tended to
see science as boring, confusing and lacking relevance in the busy nature of their
day-to-day lives. Although some could see that they largely took science for granted,
accepting that it underpins most aspects of modern society, they were not at all
committed to understanding it.
The focus groups showed that where these less interested people had been engaged
by pieces of information related to science, it tended to relate to medical advances
that are well publicised in the media, to their children’s school work or to large
and significant world events such as the Japanese earthquake.
For details of the survey methodology and focus groups, please refer to Chapter
4 of the report.
Technology
Perceptions of the overriding pervasiveness of technology were dominant in the qualitative
research. An integral and fundamental part of modern life, technology is seen almost
as the defining feature of modernity. Although when probed, almost every conceivable
tool of humankind can be seen as technology – from the humble knife and fork to
the latest electronic gadget – technology is more normally associated with innovative
products that are designed to make our lives easier or better.
The difference in perspective on technology between the older and younger groups
was also interesting. Those in the older group have seen a continual rise of technology
infiltrating every aspect of their lives, from fifty years ago when television in
Australia was still broadcast in black and white to 2011 where it is now possible
to be connected to the sum total of human knowledge via the Internet through a smartphone
– things that were unimaginable or perhaps in the realm of science fiction even
twenty years ago are now commonplace.
Older groups tended to see technology as offering a degree of luxury and convenience
not possible in their youth – they also see technology as related more to companies
making money and to economic progress. Associated with the perception among older
Victorians of technology as a luxury was a tendency to see much of it as non-essential,
while younger groups rely on computers, smartphones and the Internet to a far greater
degree. In fact, other research conducted by Sweeney Research in the past year has
shown that the Internet is the number one thing that 16-30 year olds feel they could
not live without. *
For details of the survey methodology and focus groups, please refer to Chapter
4 of the report.
* Sweeney – Lifelounge Urban Market Research 2010
