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The Public Image of Science and Its Funding

Biomedical researchers are being more rigorously scrutinized by various segments of the nonscientific public. Accusations of misconduct, conflict-of-interest, and cruelty to animals, for example, and a fear of eroding congressional support for basic biological research have increased scientists’ concern about the public’s perception of their profession. At the recent annual meeting of The American Society for Cell Biology, Boyce Rensberger, a leading science writer for the Washington Post,said that, in his own “quick study, science may have an image problem, when viewed from the scientific community’s point of view, but I’m not so sure that anybody else would see it as a problem.” Rensberger said that scientists are definitely held lower in public esteem than they were a generation ago. However, he added, “according to repeated national polls of which professions the public admires most, all other professions are down, too. Doctors have always been first and scientists second. Today, scientists are still second to physicians.”