Race and Public Communication about Human Variation

This project explores the feasibility of producing messages about human genetic variation that are non-discriminatory in their impact on public attitudes. Toward this end it pursues three research objectives. First, the project employs focus groups to describe existing lay understandings of the relationships among genetics, race, and human characteristics (including disease). Second, building on the results of the focus groups, it will use a representative population survey and a message impact study to identify vocabularies and to generate sample messages for communicating about human variation in nondiscriminatory ways. Third, it will develop a reliable and appropriate measurement scale for assessing the discriminatory impact of messages about human genetic variation. The project will focus on the concerns of African Americans about discrimination and genetics and on attitudes about African Americans and genetics held by European Americans and the general population.