Epistemological autonomy: how lay people do their own research to keep experts at arm’s length

With growing worries about skepticism and distrust in science, we see a tension between lay people being driven to accept science and expert advice while populist politicians such as Robert F. Kennedy Jr. reject established expertise and advise parents to “do their own research” on vaccinations. Recent literature investigates how individuals in particular political or cultural contexts navigate this tension either through “epistemological individualism” or “ambivalence.” This study advances sociological understanding of how lay citizens navigate the middle ground between pure acceptance and rejection of expertise. They do this by exercising a strategy of epistemological autonomy, which includes doing one's own research and trying to level with experts, all with the objective of staying in control rather than ceding authority to the experts. Our respondents come from a wide variety of social, political, and cultural backgrounds, and most of them strive for autonomous control of how experts and expertise get to impact their lives and life decisions, even though they also express wide appreciation for science. The abductive analysis is based on 150 semi-structured interviews across five countries about why people follow their own research or the advice of experts.