Consumer science beyond testing:
Talking multiple meanings
Cheryl Jakab, Jakab Creative
All consumer decisions result to some extent
in wider social, financial and environmental
consequences. Each lifestyle choice, from
which soap we decide to buy to unwanted
packaging and brand loyalty, impacts on the
environment, other people and businesses, as
well as having personal efficacy and impacts
on finances. Consumer literacy enables people
to apply knowledge, skills and values to assess
the impacts of consumer-related decisions
on themselves, the community and the
environment, now and in the future (Curriculum
Corporation, 2008).
In our 21st century consumer society, each
person needs to develop critical skills to be able
to assess the accuracy and appropriateness of
available information and advertising claims
within a wider context. In this process individual
preferences and aesthetics often heavily
influence choices, rather than rational analysis
of claims and well thought through decisions.
Having a positive attitude into ‘looking below
the surface’ of the information and terminology
presented by advertising, can result in major
changes in personal choice and aesthetics,
including what we choose to think about and
what we value as important when making
choices.
Making informed choices
Today general advertising, the media and
lobby groups often use scientific sounding
terminology and quote scientific testing to
help sway consumer choice. Literacy in science,
as a method of working (scientific thinking
and reasoning and processes) and scientific
knowledge (concepts, theories and principles),
can help inform this personal decision-making.
Appreciation of the relationships between
science terms used in science classrooms, and
science terms used as popularly understood
symbols in everyday consumer society, by
talking multiple meanings, can enhance school
learning.
10 Let’s Find Out Vol 26 • No. 2 • 2009
Consumer science can help us determine all
aspects of costs of our preferences, not just
efficacy of products and determining value
for money as compared to low price. Thus
empowering learners with scientific consumer
literacy by integrating it into science classroom
practices can have a dual impact. It can assist
students make informed choices as consumers
and at the same time help make science
classroom learning more meaningful, relevant
and available to learners.
The best potato chip product
test
Take for example
the simple and
very popular
potato chip. How
would you choose
‘the best chip’?
(See Jakab and
Keystone, 1997.)
What tests would you do? How objective an
assessment can this be? The fact that science as
a process is much more messy than our usual
science lessons suggest come out loud and
clear in this type of study. This should not be
considered a problem, but rather an asset to
be utilized in helping students understand that
science investigation is messy and not always a
direct process using ‘the scientific method.’
Reacting to advertisements
‘Anything that is co-optable is going to be coopted by power systems for doctrinal purposes.’
Noam Chomsky linguist, New Scientist, 26th July
2008.
As a way of preparing to read this article, to help
you get the most out of the ideas involved, I
would like to begin by asking you the reader to
put off reading this paper now. I request that you
look for some images in everyday media that
relate to your area of science. Chemical formulae,
drawings of atoms, or references to evolution or
energy may be suitable. This is exactly how the
classroom activity I am suggesting would begin.
Now record one comment that describes
your first reaction on seeing each item (there
is space in the table at the end of this article,
which has a worksheet that you can fill in as you
read this paper, as an example of the type of
meaning-making worksheet that is of use in the
classroom). I will come back to these responses a
little later.
You can find some advertising images at these
web addresses:
http://www.tomsporer.de/assets/images/
PROJECT_NIVEA_DNAGE_SMALL04.jpg
http://www.goswitch.com.au/green-energy
http://www.greenadvertisinglaw.com/10-waysto-avoid-making-suspect-green-advertisingclaims.html
As science teachers we are comfortable with and
literate in science terminology and processes to
a higher degree than the average person; so we
can deconstruct the use of science in items in
the media, advertising and everyday contexts.
Being knowledgeable in science, or even fully
scientifically literate – if that is at all possible (see
Shamos, 1995) – does not necessarily mean that
we are protected from the powerful effects of
advertising, or always avoid the ‘consumer traps’
set by clever marketing. I suggest looking to
the ABC television program The Gruen Transfer
for an interesting take on this. Even experts
can become enculturated (or indoctrinated) to
accepting whatever advertisers and marketing
put before us. Appealing to wishful thinking,
selfish reasoning and selective use of factual
information can mislead or help us come to
surprising conclusions at times, which on
reflection we may wonder ‘How did I think that?’
As a good example I suggest you go to The
Social Issues Research Centre website that ‘foster
the image of…a heavyweight research body,’
as Annibel Ferriman wrote in the British Medical
Journal in 1999 (vol319, p716). It is run by the PR
marketing company MCM Research, which used
to announce on its website:
‘Do your PR initiatives sometimes look too much
like PR initiatives? MCM conducts psychological
research on the positive aspects of your business….
The results do not read like PR.’ David Miller, New
Scientist, 26 July 2008.
Despite this claim the site is worth a visit as a
reference for science teaching, not just as an
example of ‘bad science’. On this site a timeline
of developments in ‘science’ related to health
issues is an excellent resource for teaching.
http://www.sirc.org/timeline/timeline_front.
shtml. Following is an example accessed from
the timeline.
July 2003
Dairy diet may prevent asthma Young children
who regularly eat products containing milk fat are
less likely to develop asthma, research suggests.
Scientists say the finding provides strong evidence
that while asthma may, in part, be a genetic
condition, it is certainly influenced by lifestyle
factors too. A team from the Dutch National
Institute of Public Health and the Environment
analysed the diet of nearly 3,000 two-year-olds.
They found that by the age of three, those who had
eaten full cream milk and butter on a daily basis
were less likely to have developed symptoms of
asthma. Daily consumption of brown bread was
also associated with lower rates of asthma.
(Source: http://www.sirc.org/timeline/2003.shtml)
Let’s Find Out Vol 26 • No. 2 • 2009
11
Consumer science beyond testing (continued)
Comments on a linked article in the Guardian
newspaper entitled ‘The truth about juice’
prompted many comments from the readership
about the poor science in the above study.
Below is just one example:
‘The author is absolutely right and many posts
have misinterpreted the article. Firstly, there is
a difference between correlation and causality.
Secondly, where is the experimental data to
demonstrate the validity of any of these claims?
There has been such a blurring of the scientific
method in the public mind (as well as a perversion
of logic) that people are now convinced about
anything by a whizzy graph on TV.’ (Reader
comment on ‘The truth about juice’ Guardian
newspaper.)
What are food groups in
‘scientific’ and ‘everyday’
thinking?
group. By the 1950s school children were taught
there were four basic food groups (De Puis,
2002). Dairy had become one of these. Each time
the ‘dietary recommendation’ is reviewed, lobby
groups from marketing sectors work hard for
their products. Refer to the history of Nutrition
Guidance (USA) below for an example of how
groupings evolve.
Figure 1: A standard food pyramid
Food groups are a good example of ‘science’
that is in everyday culture that are more likely
to be culturally determined than ‘scientific’ food
groups. Many food groups in science textbooks
also have little resemblance to chemical food
categories.
For a collection of international food groupings
and nutritional recommendations go to http://
archives.starbulletin.com/1999/04/21/features/
story1.html. On this site you will find examples
from Japan, Phillipines, Netherlands, Canada,
Israel and Great Britain.
As a specific, and non-trivial example with far
reaching effects, let me put before you my take
on the story of how milk came to be considered
a food group. This is a great example of how
culture and history, and everyday rather than
scientific thinking can have more to do with
what is accepted ‘scientific knowledge’ than
‘objective’ data (Vygotsky, 1986). In the 1930s the
milk marketing board in the USA introduced the
idea that milk is a food group as an advertising
campaign. You would have to say this is one of
the most successful campaigns in history. Milk
is now shown in most good food pyramids as
a food group in science textbooks, research
documents and product information. Back in the
1930s there were 12 recognized food groups and
lobbying from the Milk Marketing Board helped
to get milk, eggs and butter classed as one major
To a large extent, still today, the status of milk as
recommended for daily intake in a ‘healthy diet’
is based far more on product marketing, finances
and agriculture than health. As far back as the
1960s research by the World Health Organization
was showing that milk was unsuitable for a large
proportion of many cultural groups. Changing
the good food guides to more scientific
chemistry/nutrition based groups, away from
the current cultural-historic and economically
based one is proving a very difficult task, made
more difficult by constant lobbying of interest
groups. Collecting cultural images of the ways
foods are grouped from everyday life may be a
good way to inform our learner that food groups
are not fixed, or necessarily based in chemistry,
health or known best dietetic practice.
12 Let’s Find Out Vol 26 • No. 2 • 2009
History of Nutrition Guideance (USA)
1916
5 groups
Milk & Meat
Vegetables & Fruits
Cereals
1933
12 groups
Milk
Lean Meat,
Poultry & Fish
Eggs
Dry Beans,
Peas & Nuts
Tomatos & Citrus Fruits
Leafy Green & Yellow Veg
Other Veg & Fruits
Potatos & Sweet Potatos
Flours &
Cereals
Other Fats
1942
“Basic
seven”
Meat,
Milk &
Poultry,
Milk
Fish, Eggs,
Products Dried Peas
& Beans
Bread,
Flour &
Cereals
Butter &
Fortified
Margarine
Oranges,
Tomatos
& Grapefruits
Green &
Yellow
Veg
Potatos &
Other Veg
& Fruits
Meat,
Poultry,
Milk &
1956
Fish, Eggs,
Milk
Dried
“Basic four” Products
Beans &
Nuts
Fruits & Vegetables
Grains
Meat,
Poultry,
Milk,
Fish, Eggs,
Yoghurt
Dried
& Cheese
Beans &
Nuts
Fruits & Vegetables
Grains
1992
“Food
Guide
Pyramid”
Fats & Fat
Foods
Butter
Sugars &
Sugary
Foods
Sugars
Fats &
Sweets
Source: Based on information from http://www.pcrm.org/magazine/GM97Autumn?GM97Autumn2.html
What is consumer science?
When I think of consumer science my thoughts,
like many science teachers, usually go to
‘controlled scientific research’ into product
claims. This idealized testing can be very
informative, particularly when conducted
independently, such as you might see in Choice
magazine (www.choice.com.au). An example
that is always popular is Can dark chocolate be
ethical, good for you and delicious? published
online November 2008. A panel of experts rated
22 brands of chocolate and 65 everyday tasters
also rated 15 of the chocolates. Differences
between criteria used by experts and that used
by novices is an interesting take on this subject
that comes out very clearly in this research.
Selling products with
consumer testing
The type of ‘controlled scientific tests’ product
testing is often used as a way of selling a product
– the image of long flowing hair (on a beautiful
model) in a shampoo add or the white coated
scientist ‘proving’ that a product is better are
typical images that come to mind. It comes as
no surprise that the design and use of these
tests can make them anything but ‘objective’. It
is now clear for instance that pharmaceutical
companies are more likely to fund and/or
publish research that shows the efficacy of their
products than research that shows the opposite.
Having students come up with controlled
scientific product tests can be a valuable
approach in science: one that I support and
think well worth the effort of pursuing. Students
Let’s Find Out Vol 26 • No. 2 • 2009
13
Consumer science beyond testing (continued)
come up with many ingenious methods of
collecting data, and grapple with the very
value laden problems of designing ‘controlled
tests’ and collecting ‘objective measurements’.
These traditional scientific consumer tests as
used in advertising co-opt scientific language,
and confuse correlation and causation in
interpretation.
Take for example this product described in New
Scientist feedback page.
‘myth busting’ coke
ads get a reality check
The Australian Competition and Consumer
Commission yesterday ordered Coco-Cola
to publish corrections in newspapers
around the country over its ‘motherhood
and myth-busting’ campaign last year...the
ad had potential to mislead consumers by
suggesting Coco-Cola could not contribute
to weight gain, obesity and tooth decay.
Daniella Miletic, Consumer affairs reporter
The Age Friday April 3, 2009 page 3.
Advertising arguments and
‘pseudoscience’
On television and in papers each day, in all forms
of media, science terminology is used, co-opted
and turned into everyday language in product
advertising and news reports. ‘Green products’
are everywhere. Cars are now environmentally
friendly with ‘low carbon emissions’ and organic
products are ‘more natural’. You have already
reacted to a small set of such advertisements.
The process of science is co-opted to the
interests of the producers; sometimes amusingly
due to the lack of real ‘science’.
What do you notice?
Let’s return now to your comments made
at the beginning of this article in response
to advertisements using ‘science’ and
‘pseudoscience’ claims.
What did you notice in each case?
What took your interest?
Can you describe your response as ‘good’ or
‘bad’ response towards the product or the
advertisement?
Were you focused on the accuracy? Or were you
simply reminded of what you need to buy next
time? Or did an image influence you (such as
flowing hair in a shampoo advertisement)?
We all focus on different things, and although
you have a cue from the article’s title, I
14 Let’s Find Out Vol 26 • No. 2 • 2009
tried to present the idea of looking at the
advertisements before I flavoured your thoughts
too much. Each response has value and could
lead us to interesting areas of shared thoughts
and meanings. What I do as teacher with each
and every response is important to learners
both personally and to their learning. What
each person thinks about these advertisements
and the meanings raised by others are also
important and can help progress learning. We
have devoted a lot of our time here to looking
at these responses – developing a social and
individual space where ideas can develop and
grow (Wellington and Osborne, 2001).
Students as everyday
consumers
The students in our science classes are already
experts in making decisions about consumer
products. They have spent many years
considering prices and value for money when
buying an extensive range of products. As
science teachers we can add to this expertise
by helping them better understand some of
the science used in designing advertising and
testing products. Too often science content is
seen as outside the everyday life of our students.
Some of the science terminology being used
by advertisers includes words with specific
technical, scientific meaning appropriated by
society to come to have alternate everyday
meaning. Polyunsaturated, cholesterol and
even extra-virgin olive oil become loaded with
cultural meaning and move from being specific
terms that have meaning as a chemical, to
desirable and undesirable with health effects
unlinked from the research that demonstrates
their roles in the body or the processes of
metabolism.
The terms become everyday entities, isolated
from the meaning that the science that
developed it, has given it. We often think of
science classes as providing terminology and
giving learners access to correct science. Unless
the relationship between the ‘everyday’ and the
classroom ‘scientific’ are clearly delineated in
science classes the confusion between the two
will persist, and unhelpfully, be enhanced by the
barrage of ‘science’ used by marketers.
Thus I see a great opportunity for us as science
teachers to enhance students’ functional
scientific literacy by using consumer product
information, as well as scientific consumer
testing, as a vehicle for students to become more
informed consumers. According to Vygotsky
(1987) everyday concepts lay the foundation of
learning the scientific.
One method of making science more relevant
to everyday life is to incorporate everyday
experiences into science learning (Aikenhead,
2006). Ideas expressed by Lee in Tobin and
Roth (2007) are also worth considering here,
where differences between informal and formal
settings are included as well as free choice and
mandated content. I will consider one consumer
issue covered on an Insight program aired on
SBS in 2008 related to recent melamine and
other poisoning events and product safety in
general.
Insight into consumer issues
In considering product safety many scientific
terms are used in social discussions, that may
have specific meaning to the chemists and other
scientists involved but have many and varied
companion meanings in society. In the case
of melamine in baby milk causing deaths, the
word melamine is used – as a word for a poison
– without any chemical scientific significance.
This is a case in which people are dealing with
complex science to understand what happened
in a social disaster, and extremely surprised
that consumers are not better protected by our
system.
We expect products to be safe. However our
knowledge of the sea of toxic chemicals we
live in is very poor. Programs such as Insight
and current news items as well as product
advertising can be a great starting point for a
range of science topics. The fact that a current
social issue is at the heart of the topic makes the
Let’s Find Out Vol 26 • No. 2 • 2009
15
Consumer science beyond testing (continued)
terminology more culturally available, brings
in a range of social, emotional and aesthetic
meanings, can make the range of ideas ‘messy’
in terms of the scientific investigations, but this
must be viewed as a strength not a weakness.
The very fact that the topic has emotional
meaning provides greater chance of personal
transformations occurring in the learning.
Everyday science word use
influences meanings
Science terminology and processes are used
extensively on products and in advertising
today. Much of this language is science content
based, and often extremely technical in nature.
Advertising takes words, often out of context,
and make them sound powerful. From microlipids in face lotions, to isotonic and hypertonic
sport drinks, and phosphate free advertising
of washing powders with enzyme action ‘for
clothes whiter than white’ we have scientific
sounding words used in ways that are designed
to convince but not inform.
In fact for most people in our society these
are the only places that they contact this
terminology. These words only have meaning
in relation to this everyday use. These are both
incorrect meanings and socially embedded
accepted meanings. Cholesterol becomes a
substance that you get in certain foods that
causes heart attacks. It is not the same thing
as a biochemist’s definition. How close the
everyday (or naïve or cultural ideas) can be to
the ‘scientific’ has been extensively studied in
alternative conceptions research.
Constructivist researchers have focused heavily
on designing teaching to move the ‘naïve
everyday idea’ towards the ‘scientific’. Experience
shows this is much harder than had initially been
thought. In all areas of science initial ideas are
remarkably resistant to change and often remain
alongside classroom learning, to come into use
in everyday life. These are not misconceptions
necessarily, but everyday use of language,
some of which existed before the current
16 Let’s Find Out Vol 26 • No. 2 • 2009
scientific idea evolved and some appropriated
by society for other uses. We all have experience
of doing this. We get up in the morning and
talk of ‘sunrise’, even though we know full well
that it is the Earth turning that has caused the
effect. Even physics teachers use the scientific
terms ‘energy’ and ‘work’ in our everyday lives
in common usage senses, and then switch to a
different mode in classrooms, trying to shift our
students’ understandings.
Jabberwocky: Nonsense with
meaning
The aesthetic experience of going through
changes in understanding is like going into a
foreign land, where you do not have a good
grasp of the language. Let’s take a look at the
classic piece by Lewis Caroll, Jabberwocky. I am
not the first to use this example to show what it
is like in ‘foreign lands’.
‘Jabberwocky!
‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.
(By Lewis Caroll)
Now can you say:
What was it like in this place?
What were the tothes doing? …and the mome
raths?
How were the borogroves?
Despite the fact the words are made up we
can take meaning from their presentation in
this communication. You can probably answer
the above questions quite readily, but what do
you know of this fictitious world? What does
outgrabe mean?
This is a wonderful poem with all its nonsense
words placed in language form that make sense.
But imagine you are a child in your science class
listening to as much ‘nonsense’ coming from
the teachers’ mouth describing a world that
they simply do not relate to. For without a solid
foundation of links between the everyday world
and the world of science with language this is
what science classrooms can feel like. A slow and
active enculturation into the new ideas through
all available everyday experiences is vital to
scientific understanding being able to develop.
The big picture is important at the same time
– the two interrelate – the overall world view
along with the details together gives a coherent
picture.
Talking meanings in the
classroom
Let’s take a look at one simple typical classroom
activity to help understand the issue.
Imagine you are given a green powder, which your
teacher says is a chemical that exists as a solid
crystalline compound.
(adapted from p 44 of Barnett and Green, 2007).
What do you understand by the terms ‘solid’ and
‘compound’?
What is a chemical?
How many different ways do you use these
words?
This simple activity could take a long time to
complete if the student has a long way to ‘travel’
in developing ‘scientific’ understandings and
uses of these words. I am not saying do not do
this activity. Nor am I saying the exact activity is
not valuable, in fact I think it a very direct route
to the heart of the problem I am alluding to. I am
simply proposing that the activity requires more
concentration and time, including the teacher’s
interactions with students, and openness in the
class activity to attending to the terminology,
and in particular multiple meanings that the
learner brings. A shared terminology is needed
to progress with the activity if it is to allow
desired conceptual development – whether
that involves ‘assimilation’ of the concepts into
current ideas or ‘accommodation’ of concepts
into newer ones.
When dealing with terms that students bring
in from everyday life, or ones you choose from
media or advertisments, it may not be necessary
to come to specific shared meanings so much
as to allow and encourage examination of
meanings and their impacts on how we think
about products and issues.
‘Talking ideas into being’ is a powerful learning
tool. Each student needs an amount of time to
get used to the language, to start tentatively
and revisit again and again the ideas, terms and
processes to constantly refine understanding,
rather than the idea being available immediately
as a kind of gestalt shift. Only by being
comfortable enough to approach learning in this
way, where the aesthetics of the situation are
embraced, does true learning occur (Wickman,
2006).
The power of advertising
I sometimes feel I am the visitor to another
world when I sit and listen to advertisments
on TV. Marvelous half science, half advertising
lingo comes battering at me, convincing me
that this product will do the trick for me. The
jingle covers the introduction of words that
sound powerfully scientific, that sneak directly
into my subconscious. Through lulled defenses
my hackles often rise, protecting me from
accepting what my reasoning self knows to be
a sham. According to Dewey and Wittgenstein
the human mind is inseparable from history
and culture. These are the background to our
habits of mind and the places that we encounter
customs.
“Both Dewey and Wittgenstein strongly opposed
the idea that our thinking can be understood
as representations of finite states in the world.
…Wittgenstein was incessantly reminding us that
of how we actually use language as integral to an
activity ” (Wickman, 2006).
Learning is neither purely in the individual
mind, or purely socially influenced. Science
learning is impacted by individual and social
Let’s Find Out Vol 26 • No. 2 • 2009
17
Consumer science beyond testing (continued)
cultural realities. Exploring the language in use
in activities is where the various companion
meanings can be transformed towards desirable
outcomes.
Conclusion
Today bombardments from the media create
an enormous cultural force that impacts heavily
on students’ lives. In some ways this can have
greater influence on their view of ‘what is
science’ and ‘scientific’ than any other influence,
including our classrooms. By linking into this
barrage of experience, including it in our science
classroom discourses, we can influence learners’
views of science and science classroom that
are meaningful for them, and even encourage
students towards a positive aesthetic in science,
along with helping inform their consumer
practice in everyday lives. Their scientific
‘lifeworld’ can become real and more significant
to themselves, their decision making and their
real world existence.
We can and should be bridging the gap,
between the scientific and the everyday,
making this border crossing into the land of
science easier and more beneficial for our
learners (Aikenhead, 2006). In the process we
may just help debunk some unsubstantiated
beliefs, which can be clearly non- or even antiscientific. This approach has a ‘companion
meaning’ (Roberts and Ostman, 1998) of valuing
the cultural starting point of the learner and
enculturate them into a more scientific way of
being. Talking multiple meanings of science in
advertising can thus influence both cognitive
processes in consumer literacy and more
importantly perhaps for science teachers the
overall aesthetic for learners of being in science
classrooms and doing science.
18 Let’s Find Out Vol 26 • No. 2 • 2009
References
ABC (2008) The Gruen Transfer.
Aikenhead, Glen S (2006) Science education for everyday life:
Evidence -based practice, Teachers College Press, New York.
Barnett, Richard and Green, Derek (2007) Scientific enquiry
skills, Book 1, Instant Lessons, Blake Education and Brilliant
Publications, Clayton South.
Bearison, David J. and Dorval, Bruce (2002) Collaborative
cognition: Children negotiating ways of knowing, Ablex Publishing,
Westport, CT.
Choice magazine online www.choice.com.au
Commonwealth of Australia (2008) Consumer and financial
literacy, Curriculum corporation, Carlton.
Roberts, Douglas A. and Ostman. Leif (1998) Problems of meaning
in science curriculum Teachers College Press, New York.
DuPuis E. Melanie (2002) .Nature’s Perfect Food: How Milk Became
America’s Drink. New York: New York University Press.
Jakab, Cheryl and Keystone, David (1997) Our best guess, Science
Infotexts, Nelson ITP, South Melbourne.
Roth, Wolff-Michael (2005) Talking science: Language and learning
in science classrooms, Rowman and Littlefield Publishers Inc,
Maryland.
SBS Insight screened Tuesday 7.30.
Shamos, Morris H (1995) The myth of scientific literacy, Rutgers
University Press, New Jersey.
Sutton, Clive (1992) Words, Science and Learning. Open University
Press, Buckingham.
Vygotsky, L (1986) Thought and language, MIT Press London (first
published in Russian in 1934).
Wellington, Jerry and Osborne, Jonathan (2001) Language and
literacy in science education, Open University Press, Buckingham.
Wickman, Per-Olof (2006) Aesthetic experience in Science
education: learning and meaning-making as situated talk and
action, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Mahwah, New Jersey.
Meaning making Activity Record sheet
Activity
Response
Metacognition: Comments / I am thinking…
1. My responses
2. Food groups
List the major food groups
3. Potato chip test
Plan
4. Significant features
What did I notice?
5. Insight
6. Jabberwocky as a
foreign land
What sort of day was it?
Describe the conditions?
How do the toves move?
7. Talking meanings
Solid
Compound
Chemical
Let’s Find Out Vol 26 • No. 2 • 2009
19