Indicators of public attitudes toward STI through open panel data. The CIVES Observatory

Individual-level indicators capable of capturing societal perceptions of science, technology, and innovation (STI) represent a key priority for understanding the societal dimension of technological change and the evolving relationship between science and society. This paper explores the analytical potential of open data from research panels for studying public attitudes toward STI. We present the case of the Online Research Panel (ORP), an opt-in panel composed of 10,000 residents in Italy, developed within the FOSSR research infrastructure. The panel supports the CIVES Observatory, a multi-thematic longitudinal survey which enables the analysis of how science-related attitudes intersect with civic engagement and other relevant societal dimensions, also providing a module targeted at retrieving information from the subpopulation of the PhD holders. Drawing on data from the first wave of the survey, the paper illustrates how open panel data can support the development of STI indicators capable of capturing the social dimension of STI.