Publicity Sociology vs. Public Sociology
How the Legacy Media and Social Media Distorts Science
Last week, we had a good debate on whether public sociology has lived up to its promise. David Brady responded to my comments in a lengthy and interesting thread on Twitter, which you can read here. In the discussion, David introduced the term “publicity” sociology, which he co-invented with Matthew Mahutga. Below, I offer some comments about “publicity sociology.”
David’s point is simple. Many sociologists conflate public attention with bringing quality science to the public. This results in a situation where sociologists produce research that is designed to generate attention, even if the research is flawed. What some folks call “media sociology,” David calls “click bait sociology.”
We can dig a little deeper here. This model is similar to Bryan Caplan’s model in The Myth of the Rational Voter. In that book, Caplan argues that voters don’t have an incentive to make good choices. You can vote in any way you want and there is no feedback. Thus, people just vote according to their biases and we get bad government policies.
Brady and Mahutga are making a parallel case about science. If you are producing science for the public, then you are measuring success in terms of attention you get from people who have little invested in good science. Thus, you incentivize work that is flashy and fun rather than well grounded.
For example, if you are aiming at penetrating traditional media, you need to make work that caters to what those journalists love and they love sensational articles. When they aren’t ambulance chasing, journalists also love to pick science that fits pre-determined narratives. For a great illustration, check out Hallet, Stapleton, and Sauder’s Public Ideas article.
Social media bias is even worse. As we’ve learned, academic work gathers attention in social media if it generates outrage, or fits what people want to hear. It also incentivizes people who are clever and witty rather than quality science. Twitter is the probably the worst environment one can imagine for curating science for the public.
While David wanted to distinguish between good and bad public sociology, but the idea of “publicity sociology” draws attention to a more fundamental structural problem. If the public is biased, then that produces really bad incentives and it is hard to work around them. Perhaps one response is to go back to an expert-elite model of public sociology where experts work with social elites (e.g., government officials or business leaders) to develop policy.
Bottom line: The idea of public sociology sounds cool but it seems to be susceptible to the problems of catering to irrational consumers. Buyer beware.
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Publicity Sociology vs. Public Sociology
Very nicely said Fabio!