Cultural cognition of the risks and benefits of nanotechnology

• Published in: Nature nanotechnology Vol. 4; no. 2; pp. 87 - 90
• Main Authors: Kahan, Dan M., Braman, Donald, Slovic, Paul, Gastil, John, Cohen, Geoffrey
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Nature Publishing Group UK 01.02.2009; Nature Publishing Group
• Subjects: Association; Awareness; Chemistry and Materials Science; Cognition; Cognitive ability; Culture; Diffusion of Innovation; Familiarity; Generalization (Psychology); Humans; Hypotheses; Information Dissemination; letter; Materials Science; Nanotechnology; Nanotechnology - economics; Nanotechnology - ethics; Nanotechnology - trends; Nanotechnology and Microengineering; Observer Variation; Problem solving; Public Opinion; Research Support as Topic - statistics & numerical data; Research Support as Topic - trends; Risk Assessment - statistics & numerical data; Set (Psychology)

How is public opinion towards nanotechnology likely to evolve? The ‘familiarity hypothesis’ holds that support for nanotechnology will likely grow as awareness of it expands. The basis of this conjecture is opinion polling, which finds that few members of the public claim to know much about nanotech...