Public, Science, and Cultural Distance

Abstract

This article attempts to define cultural distance and proposes a method to empirically measure it. Using the survey data on perceptions of common citizens, the authors measure this distance in this article by the number of years spent in formal schooling. Cultural distances based on people's explanations of various natural phenomena have been mapped to demonstrate efficacy of the proposed method. The authors argue that the determinants of the magnitude of the cultural distance are (1) the complexity involved in explaining a phenomenon, (2) its life cycle, (3) individual or a collective control that can be exercised to alter the life cycle, and (4) the intensity with which a phenomenon intervenes in the daily life of common citizens.