Professor Martin Bauer, COL. B804

MSc Media and Communications, MSc Media and Communications (Research), MSc Social Research Methods, MSc Social and Cultural Psychology, MSc Analysis, Design and Management of Information Systems, MSc Culture and Society, MSc Regulation, MSc Organisational and Social Psychology, MSc Biomedicine, Bioscience and Society and MSc Social and Public Communication. Students on degrees without a social psychology or media component may attend subject to numbers and at the discretion of the teacher responsible.

In this course we will analyse functionally how resistance, expressed in public opinion as the interplay of mass media, public perceptions and activism, impact on technological trajectories. New technology is neither good nor bad, nor is it neutral. It is a negotiated project, a growing web of engineers, lawyers, regulators, users etc, in a dynamic configuration of ideas, materials, affiliations and dissent. The discussions explore issues leading toward a social psychology of objectification.

Specific content will include:  Public opinion and representations of science and technology make and brake technological projects such as nuclear power, information technology, genetic engineering and nanotechnology. While being partially supportive, public opinion often resists: why and to what effect? This is modelled in analogy to 'acute pain' (Bauer, 1991, 1997). We will explore conceptions of 'resistance' in psychotherapy, attitude research, rural studies, risk analysis and communication, media perfect studies, group dynamics, public understanding of science, and studies of social influence. Students are expected to appreciate theory driven empirical research.

Combined lecture (one hour) (PS439) x 10 LT, + seminar/class (one hour) x 10 LT.

An essay plan of not more than 500 words is required.

M Bauer (Ed), Resistance to New Technology - Nuclear Power, Information Technology, Biotechnology, CUP, 1997; J Carloppio, 'A history of social psychological reactions to new technology', Journal of Occupational Psychology, 61, 1988; B Joerges, 'Technology in everyday life: conceptual queries', Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour, 18, 1988; B Latour, 'On inter-objectivity', Mind, Culture and Activity, 3, 228-245, 1996; T Marteau & M P M Richards (Eds), The Troubled Helix: Social and Psychological Implications of the New Human Genetics, CUP, 1996; J Van der Plight, Nuclear Energy and the Public, Blackwell, 1992; S R Weart, Nuclear Fear: A History of Images, Harvard University Press, 1988; M Bauer & G Gaskell, Biotechnology - the Making of a Global Controversy, CUP, 2000. No one book covers the entire syllabus; students will be expected to read widely in appropriate journals, and a list of references will be provided at the start of the course.