Socio-demographic correlates of DK-responses in knowledge surveys: self-attributed ignorance of science

Abstract

With the increasing specialization of the knowledge society, knowledge in some areas means ignorance in others, which amounts to the knowledge-ignorance paradox. In the debate on public understanding of science the status of “ignorance” is controversial. How is scientific ignorance distributed by age, education, religion, social category or gender? We attempt to answer this and other questions by analysing “Don't Know”-responses in a European-wide survey as a measure of self-attributed ignorance, using a regression model, and explore how different variables explain self-attributed ignorance in different countries. A pattern emerges which shows that various EU countries differ in their distribution of ignorance of science. The polysemy of ignorance of science across social settings remains a problem for future research.