Custodes Futurifor the advancement of humanity

Cultural factor, barrier 4 of 6

Distrust of expertise

Distrust of expertise slows adoption of useful knowledge. Most people trust scientists, but where trust is lower, people are less likely to follow expert advice.

Evidence

  • 68 countries. A survey of 71,922 people found that in most countries most people trust scientists and want them to engage more in society and policymaking. Trust varied within and between countries, partly by political orientation (Cologna et al., 2025).
  • Public health in 2020. In panel surveys in 12 countries, trust in scientists was the key driver of support for non-drug public health measures and of favorable attitudes toward vaccination (Algan et al., 2021).
  • Vaccination intentions. Across 25 national samples (25,334 people), trust in medical and scientific experts was among the strongest correlates of willingness to be vaccinated against COVID-19 (odds ratio 1.28). These are stated intentions (Kerr et al., 2021).

Note: The authors of the 68-country study caution that distrust among even a small minority can still affect how evidence is used in policy.

Proposed and experimental methods

Methods that are proposed, under trial, approved in some places, or tried and then failed. Each shows a stage label and an evidence rating. A stage label shows how far a method has progressed, not whether it works. The stage labels are explained on the cultural factor page.

  • Trusted health professionals as messengers (Large trial, B). In a trial randomizing 820 U.S. counties, short Facebook videos recorded by doctors and nurses reached 11,954,109 users at Thanksgiving and 23,302,290 at Christmas 2020. Travel distance fell by 0.993 percentage points in high-intensity counties and COVID-19 infections fell 3.5% in targeted zip codes, while the share leaving home on the holiday did not change (Breza et al., 2021). In Oakland, Black men randomly assigned to Black male doctors were much more likely to choose every preventive service after meeting the doctor, and the authors estimate this could reduce the Black-white male gap in cardiovascular mortality by 19% (Alsan et al., 2019).
  • Being open about uncertainty (Large trial, B). Five experiments with 5,780 people found that communicating uncertainty about facts and numbers produced only a small decrease in trust in the numbers and the source, mostly when uncertainty was given in words rather than numbers (van der Bles et al., 2020). In 10,519 people, giving a numeric range around COVID-19 statistics slightly lowered trust in the number but not in the source, while vague statements that uncertainty exists lowered trust in both (Kerr et al., 2023).
  • Faith leaders as messengers (Early trial, C). In a survey experiment with 709 unvaccinated registered voters in South Dakota in April 2021, an identical pro-vaccine message raised interest in vaccination when attributed to a religious leader, but not when attributed to a political or medical leader (Viskupič and Wiltse, 2022). It measured stated interest, not vaccination, in one state.
  • Open science and transparency to raise trust (Early trial, C). In a German survey of 504 adults, 74.0% said seeing shared materials, data, and code raised their trust in a study, but in an experiment with 588 adults, mentioning open science practices had no significant effect on trust, and only a small effect among those who noticed it (Rosman et al., 2022). In a preregistered experiment with 390 people, an animated video about reforms after the replication crisis raised trust in researchers compared with a video about the crisis alone (d = 0.26), after earlier studies using short texts had found that news of reforms did not restore trust (Methner et al., 2023).
  • Not shown to help: political endorsements by scientific journals (Failed or reversed, B). In a preregistered experiment, telling people that the journal Nature had endorsed Joe Biden caused large falls in Trump supporters' trust in Nature and in scientists in general, and reduced their requests for Nature articles on vaccine efficacy, with small and mostly insignificant gains among Biden supporters and little change in views of the candidates (Zhang, 2023).

Sources cited on this page

  1. Algan, Y., Cohen, D., Davoine, E., Foucault, M., & Stantcheva, S. (2021). Trust in scientists in times of pandemic: panel evidence from 12 countries. PNAS, 118(40), e2108576118. DOI B Moderate
  2. Kerr, J. R., Schneider, C. R., Recchia, G., Dryhurst, S., Sahlin, U., Dufouil, C., Arwidson, P., Freeman, A. L. J., & van der Linden, S. (2021). Correlates of intended COVID-19 vaccine acceptance across time and countries: results from a series of cross-sectional surveys. BMJ Open, 11(8), e048025. DOI B Moderate
  3. Cologna, V., Mede, N. G., Berger, S., et al. (2025). Trust in scientists and their role in society across 68 countries. Nature Human Behaviour, 9(4), 713-730. DOI B Moderate
  4. Alsan, M., Garrick, O., & Graziani, G. (2019). Does diversity matter for health? Experimental evidence from Oakland. American Economic Review, 109(12), 4071-4111. link B Moderate
  5. Breza, E., Stanford, F. C., Alsan, M., Alsan, B., Banerjee, A., Chandrasekhar, A. G., et al. (2021). Effects of a large-scale social media advertising campaign on holiday travel and COVID-19 infections: A cluster randomized controlled trial. Nature Medicine, 27(9), 1622-1628. link B Moderate
  6. Kerr, J., van der Bles, A. M., Dryhurst, S., Schneider, C. R., Chopurian, V., Freeman, A. L. J., et al. (2023). The effects of communicating uncertainty around statistics, on public trust. Royal Society Open Science, 10(11), 230604. link B Moderate
  7. Methner, N., Dahme, B., & Menzel, C. (2023). The "replication crisis" and trust in psychological science: How reforms shape public trust in psychology. Social Psychological Bulletin, 18, e9665. link C Limited
  8. Rosman, T., Bosnjak, M., Silber, H., Koßmann, J., & Heycke, T. (2022). Open science and public trust in science: Results from two studies. Public Understanding of Science, 31(8), 1046-1062. link C Limited
  9. van der Bles, A. M., van der Linden, S., Freeman, A. L. J., & Spiegelhalter, D. J. (2020). The effects of communicating uncertainty on public trust in facts and numbers. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 117(14), 7672-7683. link B Moderate
  10. Viskupič, F., & Wiltse, D. L. (2022). The messenger matters: Religious leaders and overcoming COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy. PS: Political Science & Politics, 55(3), 504-509. link C Limited
  11. Zhang, F. J. (2023). Political endorsement by Nature and trust in scientific expertise during COVID-19. Nature Human Behaviour, 7(5), 696-706. link B Moderate

Every source for this factor is listed on the cultural factor page.