Abstract

Scientific-technological innovation (particularly in the field of transgenic foods and cloning), scientific journalism and public opinion all share a complex relationship. The rupture of internal consensus among the scientific community, the role played by scientific journalists as "mediators" and the differentiation between what can be referred to as the "informed public" or "epistemological leaders" and the rest of the population were the starting point for our research on the impact of news related to biotechnological advances. In this paper we will show the principal characteristics of the discourse on this type of news among what we can call the "informed public". From there, we will establish a set of strategies for improving the level of scientific-technological alphabetisation in our complex societies.