Current Sociology

Please welcome our Sociologist of the Month for January 2026, Dragos M Obreja (The University of Bucharest, Romania). His article for Current Sociology Examining distrust of science and scientists: A study on ideology and scientific literacy in the European Union, co-authored with Razvan Rughinis and Daniel Rosner is Free Access this month.

Dragos M Obreja

Could you please tell us about yourself? How did you come to your field of study?

D.M. Obreja: My main academic field of interest is Human–Computer Interactions, but also the ways in which social transformation is encouraged (or, on the contrary, discouraged) through the ideas, values ??or ideologies of social actors. I believe I came to this field of study during the COVID-19 lockdown in 2020, when I was a simple undergraduate student who realized that an opportunity had arrived in which I could learn a lot, reading academic articles from the most diverse journals. That was the moment when I discovered journals that significantly influenced my academic path, journals such as Current Sociology, New Media & Society, Sociological Theory, Games and Culture, among many others.

What prompted you to research the area of your article, “Examining distrust of science and scientists: A study on ideology and scientific literacy in the European Union”?

D.M. Obreja: I think it was precisely the interest in the role of ideology in shaping social relations that influenced the subject of my research. We already know that a certain ideological background has a significant impact on the way we see the world, whether we are talking about science, religion, politics or the environment. Subsequently, I wanted to continue this discussion to see how ideologies shape/are shaped by social media algorithms, which is the subject of my PhD to be defended next year.

What do you see as the key findings of your article?

D.M. Obreja: In our research, we observed that a conservative ideological orientation influences a higher distrust in science and scientists. Based on Eurobarometer data, we observed that these effects are somewhat stronger in the countries of Northern and Western Europe, compared to the countries of Southern and Eastern Europe. However, we aimed to measure ideology in a more dynamic way, not only through the simple self-perception of the respondents. Thus, we used some dummy statements such as focus on morality instead of innovation, and national isolation due to fear of international crime instead of international co-operation and we observed that these increase distrust in science and scientists. We also observed that ideologies are actively interpreted culturally and socially, a term that Martin & Desmond (2010) call “political sophistication,” since the role of private companies to tackle with scientific issues is not statistically significant in the European space, unlike the American one.

What are the wider social implications of your research in the current social climate? How do you think things will change in the future?

D.M. Obreja: I believe our research has profound implications not only for trust in science and scientists, but also for the legitimacy of traditional social institutions. From Robert Putnam to Tom Nichols, we see a profound social transformation taking place in social institutions that once represented a symbol of authority and legitimacy. Thus, our research insists on the role that ideologies play in institutional legitimation.

Do you have any links to images, documents or other pieces of research which build on or add to the article? Or a suggested reading list?

D.M. Obreja: Of course, I will recommend both works on the loss of legitimacy of social institutions, but also my own research in which I discuss digitally mediated interactions with representatives of social institutions.

Putnam, R. (2000). Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community. NY: Simon & Schuster.

Nichols, D. (2017). The Death of Expertise: The Campaign against Established Knowledge and Why it Matters. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Gauchat, G. (2012). Politicization of science in the public sphere: A study of public trust in the United States, 1974 to 2010. American Sociological Review, 77(2), 167-187.

Obreja, D. M. (2024). When stories turn institutional: How TikTok users legitimate the algorithmic sensemaking. Social Media + Society, 10(1), 20563051231224114.

Obreja, D. M. (2022). Narrative communication regarding the COVID-19 vaccine: a thematic analysis of comments on Romanian official Facebook page “RO Vaccinare”. SN Social Sciences, 2(8), 119.