Communicating Chemistry through Cooking and Personal Health: Everyday Applications Increase Perceived Relevance, Interest, and Self-Efficacy in Chemistry

Chemistry is essential to individual and societal well-being, yet publics tend to express less interest in chemistry compared to other science fields, and many scholars have highlighted the need for more research on effective chemistry communication and informal learning outcomes. Here, we describe one strand of a collaborative, multiyear study, working with science museums to test what kinds of content can improve interest in, perceived relevance of, and self-efficacy concerning chemistry among publics. Building on the results of our museum collaborators’ findings from their tests of hands-on chemistry activities, we designed experiments testing the effects of four types of chemistry content: (1) chemistry concepts in general without mention of an application, (2) chemistry applications in everyday life, (3) chemistry applications in societal issues, and (4) each of these types of content but with connections to other science fields beyond just chemistry. To test the effects of these different content areas, we designed three survey-embedded experiments. One experiment we designed to replicate the content of the museums’ hands-on activities more directly. The other two then expanded on the museums’ findings across different focus areas (e.g., chemistry in food or health applications), one with chemistry-only information and one with chemistry alongside other science fields, to try to extend the results of the museum findings to new content. In all experiments, respondents who were randomly assigned information focused on applications in everyday life tended to be significantly more likely to report positive outcomes in interest, relevance, and self-efficacy in chemistry more broadly, relative to the other conditions. Information focused on broader societal applications was consistently less successful in comparison. We discuss the implications of these findings for furthering chemistry communication and education across publics and formats.