Characterization of mechanistic information about CoronaVirus in the public media and its effect on laypeople understanding

Leading team

Dr. Michal Haskel-Ittah

Summary

This project aims to characterize how biological mechanisms are presented in the public media and how laypeople understand and evaluate such information. The project is focused around mechanisms related to the Covid-19 pandemic.
The pandemic, and the vast amount of scientific and medical information associated with it, opened up an opportunity to study how information about biological mechanisms that is relevant to the everyday lives of all citizens is presented and perceived by laypeople. This project has the potential to provide teachers, students, laypeople and scientists tools for using and producing mechanistic information, an important step in bridging the gap between science and society.