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Rethinking the public value of science

This presentation explores the concept of science as a public good and the challenges of valuing it. The speaker discusses public perceptions of CERN using social media data and suggests ways forward. The importance of stakeholder participation and perceptions is highlighted, along with the use of big data for economic research and the analysis of public opinions. The presentation concludes by emphasizing the need to value public perceptions to support investment in research and scientific projects.

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Rethinking the public value of science

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  1. Rethinking the public value of science Maria L. Loureiro, U. Santiago de Compostela FCC Week, Brussels 25 June 2019

  2. Outline • Science as a publicgood • How to value a publicgood • Publicperceptionsabout CERN elicitedvia social media • Ways forward

  3. Motivation • Justification to thepublicaboututility of investments in scientificprojects • Citizensperceptionsmaynot be accuratewithrespecttopublicutilityofresearch • Publicscrutinyaboutresults • Cost-Benefit Analyiscriteria

  4. Science as a Global Public Good, Whatpeople “think” about CERN?

  5. PublicGood Kenneth Arrow (1962) discussed properties of knowledge that make it a public good: it is not depleted when shared, and once it is made public others cannot easily be excluded from its use. • Public good: a commodity or service that is provided without profit to all members of a society, either by the government or by a private individual or organization. • A global public good: A public good beyond borders…open science!

  6. Total EconomicValueofScience (TEV) TEV= Use Value+ Non-Use Value • Use value = patents, licences, cultural visits, …. • Non-Use Value = Optionvalue + Bequestvalue + ExistenceValue

  7. Non-Use Values • Optionvalue = A resourceorserviceisof no use today, butmaybeextremelyvaluable in thefuture…. • Bequestvalue = Totransmitknowledge and cultural heritagetofuturegenerations… • Existencevalue = Willingnesstopayto preserve a resourceorservicethatexists (blue whales…), butyoumayneverenjoyit (nottodaynortomorrow)…

  8. Total EconomicValue (TEV) • TEV (allvalues) complex and somewhatunknown in theshort term • TEV can also be difficultto compute in thelongterm: risk and uncertainty • Scenarioanalysis • Time Preferences

  9. How to value global publicgoods?,

  10. How to valuepublicgoods? • Issue at hand: No marketprices • Citizensvaluations: howmuch are youwilling to payforthistypeofresearch? • Referendatypeofquestions: publicchoiceaspect • Informationis crucial: Stakeholderparticipation and perceptions

  11. How to valuepublicgoods? • Directapproach: askcitizensabouttheirpreferences (statedpreferencetechniques) • Indirectapproach: obtainmarketinformationable to provide insightsabouthowmuchwevaluescience.

  12. DirectApproach StatedPreferenceTechniques: ContingentValuation, ChoiceExperiments, etc… • Differentpotentialbiasesmayarise • Hypotheticalbias • Interviewerbias • Social desiderabilitybias…. • Orderbias • Multipleissuesrelatedtothebiddesign: anchoring, “gamming”, … • Badsurveydesign….

  13. EconomicsandBig Data Sources • Einav and Levin (Science, 2014) describe how economic research has evolved in the area of big data and new private datasets. • A significantamountofquestions can be addressednow • New large and almost universal datasets are emerging, being complementary to administrative and public data sources.

  14. Publicperceptionsabout CERN: Whatpeople “think” about CERN?

  15. Anapproximationwith Big Social Data • Social media can be extremelyusefultovalue global publicgoods • Social Media Data sources: Unsolicitedopinionsaboutcurrenttopics • Social Media Open Data: Twitter, Facebook, Youtube…

  16. Issueswith social media • Atentification of users • Data cleaningrequirements • Boots… • Selectionbiasofusers-notperferrepresentationoftheoverallpopulation

  17. Example • Data collectedfromTwitter API (Englishaccount) • SpanishandEnglishspeakingusers • Data downloaded for thefirsttwoweeksofJune 2019 • @CERN • @AtlasExperiment • @LHC News, @CERN-LHC Live • @ALICE Experiment • @CMS Experiment

  18. Methods: SentimentAnalysis To generateknowledgeaboutoverallperceptionsandfeelingswithrespect to certaintopics

  19. TweetsinEnglish:WordCloud

  20. TweetsinEnglish (firstweeksofJune 2019)

  21. TweetsinSpanish:WordCloud

  22. TweetsinSpanish

  23. Whatisthelevelofhappiness? • TheHedonometertool: instrumentcreated to measuretheoveralllevelofhappinessorunhappinessin a particular corpus. • 10,000 mostfrequentlyusedwordwerecollectedfromdifferentsources: Google books, New York Times articles, Twittermessages.... • Mlab: Multiplelanguageswith M-Turkinput • Eachwordreceivedanevaluationfrom 1(sad)-9 (happy).

  24. Evaluations

  25. HedonometerResults • How happy are you from 1 (unhappy) to 9 (very happy)? • Tweets in Spanish: h(ave)=5.545564 • Tweets in English: h(ave)=5.353653

  26. Waysforward • Big social media willplay a major role analyzingcitizenspreferences • On real time analysis • Global dimension • Interestingheterogeneityinpreferencesmayjustifydifferentinterventions • Targetededucationalprograms • Andoptimally favor sciencecommunicationandcitizenengagement

  27. In summary…. • Valuation of thepublicperceptionsis a veryrelevanttopicforsupporting RI investment • Multipletypesofvalues and potentialusers • Future venuesmaycontemplateadditionalcriteria as well: multicriteriaanalysis….

  28. Thankyou!

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