Opinion poll: the French have an excellent image of science, but lack knowledge 

This art­icle is the first epis­ode of a two-part sur­vey con­duc­ted with Ifop in August 2022. Click here to down­load the results.

When asked about their level of sci­entif­ic know­ledge¹, only 21% of French people say they have a sat­is­fact­ory level of sci­entif­ic know­ledge – a level that is down from 2018 (27%, or ‑6 points) – with 3% who say they are very sat­is­fied. At the same time, 42% con­sider their level of sci­entif­ic know­ledge to be aver­age, while 37% con­sider that they have short­com­ings in this area, includ­ing 17% with major short­com­ings. This drop in the self-assess­ment of sci­entif­ic level could be related to the tech­nic­al level of of the sci­entif­ic debate over the last two years around Covid. 

To add pre­ci­sion: more men and those under 35 rate their sci­entif­ic lit­er­acy as sat­is­fact­ory (26% and 33% respect­ively, com­pared with 18% of women and 17% of those aged 35 and over). The more advant­age­ous pos­i­tion of young­er people is explained in par­tic­u­lar by their level of know­ledge and edu­ca­tion, which is undoubtedly high­er than that of their eld­ers. But also, by the fact that they have been in edu­ca­tion more recently. The gender gap, on the oth­er hand, can be explained in sev­er­al ways: firstly, men tend to over­es­tim­ate their know­ledge at all levels, while women tend to devalue it. In addi­tion, edu­ca­tion­al back­grounds of women make them less likely to take up sci­entif­ic sub­jects and data sug­gests they are not encour­aged to pur­sue sci­entif­ic stud­ies to the same extent as men. 

This level of sci­entif­ic know­ledge, which appears rel­at­ively low, does not seem to influ­ence the over­all image that the French have of sci­ence in gen­er­al. Thus 92% of them declare that they have a pos­it­ive image of sci­ence, includ­ing 22% who have a very pos­it­ive image. 

In detail, how­ever, the level of sci­entif­ic know­ledge has an influ­ence on the degree to which people have a pos­it­ive per­cep­tion of the dis­cip­line. Thus, 55% of those who con­sider them­selves to have a sat­is­fact­ory level of sci­entif­ic know­ledge have a very good image of sci­ence, where­as only 9% of those who con­sider them­selves to have a defi­cient level of sci­entif­ic know­ledge have a very good image of sci­ence (a dif­fer­ence of 46 points).

Although the pos­it­ive image of sci­ence is unan­im­ously shared by the French as a whole, there are nev­er­the­less divi­sions in terms of the very pos­it­ive image: more men and those in the highest socio-pro­fes­sion­al cat­egor­ies declare that they have a very pos­it­ive image of sci­ence (31% and 38% respect­ively, com­pared with only 15% of women and 14% of those in the low­est socio-pro­fes­sion­al cat­egor­ies). Fur­ther­more, sup­port­ers of oppos­i­tion parties, such as France Insou­mise, are less likely to have a very pos­it­ive image of sci­ence (18%), where­as sup­port­ers of gov­ern­ment parties are more likely to have a very pos­it­ive image: 32% of sup­port­ers of La Répub­lique en Marche, 39% of Les Répub­li­cains sup­port­ers and 28% of Social­ist Party and EELV supporters. 

More spe­cific­ally, on the sub­ject of sci­ence, more than 9 out of 10 French people agree with the state­ments that sci­ence is a source of pro­gress for man­kind (93%, includ­ing 39% who strongly agree), that it has a sig­ni­fic­ant eco­nom­ic impact through the innov­a­tions it enables (91%, includ­ing 27% who strongly agree), or that sci­ence must remain a ref­er­ence point because it enables us to dis­tin­guish between truth and false­hood on a large num­ber of sub­jects (90%, includ­ing 32% who strongly agree). 

87% of French people also con­sider that sci­ence is a col­lec­tion of attract­ive dis­cip­lines, although 70% of them con­sider them to be com­plex and not very access­ible. Also, 72% believe that the devel­op­ment of sci­entif­ic know­ledge makes man better. 

Bey­ond the image of sci­ence in gen­er­al, sci­ent­ists also enjoy a pos­it­ive image among the gen­er­al pub­lic, albeit in a some­what more nuanced way. 93% agree that sci­ent­ists are people motiv­ated by a desire for know­ledge, curi­os­ity and ima­gin­a­tion (includ­ing 35% who strongly agree). This item was the only one to meet with the approv­al of more than 9 out of 10 French people. Next comes the idea that sci­ent­ists are motiv­ated by a desire to help change the world, for 85%, of which 19% strongly agree. 8 out of 10 French people also con­sider sci­ent­ists to be trust­worthy, but only 12% strongly agree – one of the low­est scores obtained on this response item. 

The 25–34 age group is also under-rep­res­en­ted among those who trust sci­ent­ists (69%, 11 points below the aver­age) – a phe­nomen­on that seems to be grow­ing among this gen­er­a­tion, the first to have grown up with social net­works, marked by a grow­ing dis­trust of gov­ern­ing bod­ies, and more prey to the dif­fi­culties of work­ing life (com­pared to the 18–24 age group).

Oth­er state­ments testi­fy to the dis­in­ter­ested nature of research­ers: the fact that they work in the gen­er­al interest, the fact that they are ded­ic­ated and work for the good of human­ity, obtain approv­al scores of 79% and 78% respect­ively. In addi­tion, a minor­ity of French people believe that research­ers are motiv­ated by the desire to be known by the gen­er­al pub­lic (46%). 

How­ever, sev­er­al aspects con­tra­dict this image: 71% of French people recog­nise that they are motiv­ated by com­pet­it­ive­ness, 70% con­sider that they give pri­or­ity to sci­ence, some­times to the det­ri­ment of human­ity, and a major­ity expresses doubts about their inde­pend­ence (57% do not con­sider them to be independent). 

Here again, the Cov­id-19 crisis may have played a role in the neg­at­ive per­cep­tion of sci­ent­ists. A large num­ber of sci­ent­ists were inter­viewed on tele­vi­sion and 24-hour news chan­nels about the crisis, and this media cov­er­age of sci­ent­ists over more than a year may have had an impact on the rel­at­ively low pro­por­tion of French people who con­sider sci­ent­ists to be inde­pend­ent: from the moment sci­ent­ists entered the field of cur­rent inform­a­tion, in close col­lab­or­a­tion with the author­it­ies in the man­age­ment of the health crisis, their inde­pend­ence may have been called into ques­tion by a cer­tain part of the pop­u­la­tion, which was more sus­pi­cious of the authorities.