Chemistry Reference
In-Depth Information
search, cloning of human embryos) or of the implementation of knowl-
edge in certain technologies (
e.g.
the genetic manipulation of food) are
time-bound expressions of media attention, and that they reflect a much
more profound ambivalence toward 'new knowledge'. Thus, it is worth
exploring the more stable patterns and stereotypes that are reproduced by
the popular media in order to put present debates into perspective and to
arrive at realistic expectations about the possibility of changing the pub-
lic's attitudes by short-winded PR campaigns.
3.
Chemists and Chemistry in Fiction Films - Patterns and
Stereotypes
3.1 Note on methodology
The following is based on the analysis of 222 films ranging over eight
decades of movie making. The selection of films is not representative in
a statistical sense but based on a search for films depicting science and
scientists. Out of some 400 identified films the selection of the sample
was primarily guided by the availability of the films. However, an
attempt was made to have a roughly equal share of examples in each de-
cade corresponding to the distribution of the 400 films over the decades.
As can be expected the number of recent films is much higher than that
of older films.
The films were analyzed on the basis of a code sheet with about 120
categories. The results are based on the coding by several people. Due to
severe limitations of resources and time (the project was carried out in
the context of a research seminar with students doing the majority of
screening and coding) only in very few cases the inter-rater reliability of
the codings was tested. In order to keep the unavoidable impact of sub-
jective judgments small, only results that could be established with some
confidence are presented. For the same reason we refrained from further
statistical analysis of the data since that would suggest a precision that
cannot be sustained by the actual methodology used. All this implies that
the percentages given cannot be seen as reliable representative figures.
Rather they refer to our selection of movies and should not be interpreted
as absolute figures but as relative ones. In the original analysis of the
