Communicating Scientific Knowledge as News on Social Media: Analyses in Frames of Luhmann’s System Theory

• Published in: Systemic practice and action research Vol. 37; no. 3; pp. 309 - 320
• Main Author: Hakobyan, Anahit
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York Springer US 01.06.2024; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Business and Management; Data analysis; Digital technology; Knowledge; Mass media; Methodology of the Social Sciences; Organization; Pandemics; Scientific method; Social networks; Sociology; System theory; Science; Trust; Social media; System theory; Luhmann; Communication
• DOI: 10.1007/s11213-023-09659-7
• ISSN: 1094-429X

Digital technology has posed a challenge to the conventional way in which scientific knowledge was disseminated and validated within the scientific system. Scientific knowledge has interfered into the mass media system through online platforms and social media networks. This tendency tremendously expanded after the Covid-19 pandemic, which challenged scientific community around the world to search for more effective ways of communicating scientific evidence. Meanwhile, recent studies show that trust towards science has globally increased since the pandemic. Moreover, it is a key driving force behind people’s attitudes and has predictable impact on their pandemic-related behavior. Despite the widespread dissemination of scientific knowledge, it is often misrepresented, oversimplified, or distorted. People trust science globally, yet scientific knowledge is disseminated through the widely-used yet least trusted medium of social media. This paper aims to analyze the interconnection between scientific and mass media systems and its effects on communicating scientific knowledge on social media. For this purpose, the logic of digital media platforms is explored, and Luhman’s system theory is viewed as an essential theoretical background for the analyses of the spread and exposure of scientific knowledge across social media. Theoretical analyses, along with secondary data analysis of recent global studies on news consumption and trust towards the media and science, are used to analyze the structural coupling of the mass media and scientific systems. The author concludes that it is essential to interconnect scientific and mass media systems, taking into account trust towards the medium, message, and source.