In the Social Perceptions of Science Lab, we study best practices for communicating and teaching about culturally controversial science topics such as evolution, climate change, and vaccines. Much of our research has focused on perceptions of evolution and we have studied how to make evolution education more inclusive for students from different religious and racial/ethnic backgrounds using a lens of cultural competence. We are now using this same lens to build undergraduate science communication education to better equip our future scientists to communicate productively about culturally controversial science topics. 

Since our research team needs robust surveys to do our research, we also study how to build and improve survey methodology. We evaluate current surveys using both quantitative and qualitative methodologies to help researchers elevate the quality of their surveys and ultimately improve education and communication research about culturally controversial science topics.