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2025, Volume 43 Issue 3  Published:15 March 2025
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  • Technology Blockade and M&As: An Empirical Study Based on Text Analysis
  • 2025 Vol. 43 (3): 449-461.
  • Abstract ( )
  • Sino-US relations have always been one of the important factors affecting the operation and development of Chinese enterprises. Since 2017, the United States has included a number of Chinese enterprises in the "Entity List" by promulgating the Export Control Regulations. Enterprises included in the Entity List will not be able to obtain key technologies and resources from the United States, which has a great impact on the innovation strategy and development strategy of Chinese enterprises. To explore the strategies and measures for Chinese enterprises to break the foreign technology blockade, it is necessary to explore the specific impact and mechanisms of technology blockade on Chinese enterprises. According to the resource dependence theory, the need for enterprises to obtain resources from the external environment will lead to dependence on the external environment, that is, environmental constraints. Mergers and acquisitions(M&As) are often regarded as an effective way for enterprises to absorb environmental constraints. However, technology blockade caused by macro-policies is different from conventional environmental constraints, which may affect the effectiveness of M&A as a means of absorbing constraints. Therefore, this paper intends to explore whether and how technology blockade affects M&A of Chinese enterprises. This paper selects the M&A events of listed companies in China from 2016 to 2022 as the initial research sample, and obtains 21,540 observations of 4,333 enterprises after processing. Based on the text analysis of the annual report of listed companies, this paper constructs the technology blockade index, and describes the degree of enterprises affected by technology blockade through the total word frequency ratio of technology blockade keywords in the annual report text. The annual report documents are from Juchao Information Network(cninfo), and other data used in this paper is from the China Stock Market Accounting Research(CSMAR) database. Then this paper constructs an OLS model to quantitatively evaluate the impact of technology blockade on M&A of Chinese enterprises and the moderating effect of resource redundancy. This paper finds that technology blockade reduces the number of M&A of Chinese enterprises, non-precipitating redundancy enhances the negative impact of technology blockade on the number of M&A, while precipitating redundancy has no significant impact on the relationship between technology blockade and the number of M&A. The conclusions mentioned above are still valid after a series of robustness tests, including changing estimation model, adjusting research samples and changing the measurement methods of dependent variables. In addition, the results of endogenous analysis show that the regression results of this paper are still robust under the condition of alleviating endogenous problems. Mechanism analysis shows that technology blockade increases the financing cost and difficulty of enterprises, increases the financing constraints faced by enterprises, and thus reduces the number of M&A. Furthermore, the heterogeneity analysis shows that technology blockade has a significant negative impact on the number of M&A when executives have overseas background or the industry has a high degree of competition, but it is not significant on the contrary. The main contributions of this paper are as follows: (1) Most of the existing literature focuses on the impact of technology blockade on innovation. This paper explores the influence of technology blockade on M&A and its boundary conditions, and further reveals its mechanism, which supplements the related research on technology blockade and M&A. (2) Based on the resource dependence theory, this paper analyzes the environmental constraints brought by the technology blockade initiated by the government, and the influence of the special nature of this environmental constraint on M&A, which expands the research on external environmental constraints. (3) Existing studies use proxy indicators such as trade freedom index and license approval number, which makes it difficult to directly describe the impact of technology blockade. This paper constructs technical blockade index through text analysis, which provides a useful reference for the measurement of technology blockade.
  • Structural Evolution of the Global Semiconductor Trade Network and Its Stability Assessment: From an Industry Chain Perspective
  • 2025 Vol. 43 (3): 462-476.
  • Abstract ( )
  • Based on global import and export trade data from the years 2010, 2014, 2018, and 2022, this paper adopts an industry chain perspective to construct a comprehensive global semiconductor trade network encompassing three key segments: raw materials, production equipment, and components to finished products. Through an analysis of overall structure, nodal influence, and community structure, the paper delineates the structural evolution of the semiconductor trade network. Furthermore, it employs impact simulations to delve into the stability of the semiconductor trade network when subjected to different forms of shocks.The findings of this paper are as follows: (1) The global semiconductor trade network exhibits pronounced "small-world" characteristics and boasts robust connectivity. (2) The influence of traditional semiconductor powerhouses remains steadfast, but the emergence of new forces cannot be underestimated. (3) Despite the presence of a "counter-globalization" phenomenon, "globalization" continues to be the predominant trend in the global semiconductor trade network. (4) The global semiconductor trade network displays a dual nature of stability and fragility, with the trade network in the component-to-finished product segment demonstrating the highest stability. The stability of trade networks in different segments generally follows an increasing trend. This paper provides robust support for a systematic understanding of the structural evolution and stability of the global semiconductor trade network. Based on the analytical results, it is imperative for China to explore a more pragmatic path for semiconductor industry development. While striving to enhance the domestication rate, active participation in the global industrial chain and value chain division should continue to be the focal point of industrial policies.
  • Characteristic facts and policy needs of Chinese enterprises to conduct basic research: An analysis based on a questionnaire survey of 763 enterprises
  • 2025 Vol. 43 (3): 477-487.
  • Abstract ( )
  • Although the lack of investment in enterprise basic research has become a general consensus, the structural characteristics of heterogeneous enterprise basic research are rarely discussed, which restricts the effectiveness of China's enterprise basic research policy. Based on the questionnaire survey, this paper studies the typical characteristics of basic research of Chinese enterprises from the aspects of investment and development mode, internal driving factors and obstacles, and policy demands. It is found that under the appearance of low investment in basic research in China, there are differences in the heterogeneity of basic research of enterprises: First, scientific based industrial enterprises and larger enterprises show stronger enthusiasm for basic research; Second, "independent development" is the main way of enterprise basic research, private enterprises are more inclined to independent basic research than state-owned enterprises; Third, the goal of basic research in science-based industrial enterprises mainly focuses on improving the exploratory innovation ability, while the basic research in engineering and technology-intensive industrial enterprises focuses on developing the exploitative innovation ability. Fourthly, lack of talents and funds and high risk are the three major factors that hinder enterprises from carrying out basic research. Among them, lack of talents and funds is the main obstacle that restricts scientific and engineering technology-intensive industrial enterprises from carrying out basic research, while "lack of talents" is the key pain point of basic research in private enterprises. Fifth, the existing basic research support policies for enterprises generally have the problems of low benefits and low effectiveness, and the capital subsidy and talent support policies have uneven resource distribution between state-owned enterprises and private enterprises. This paper can be used as a reference for understanding the current situation and problems of Chinese enterprise basic research, and can also provide some inspiration for the government to formulate targeted policies for enterprise basic research.
  • Research on the mobility of scientific and technical talents between China and countries along the Belt and Road
  • 2025 Vol. 43 (3): 488-506.
  • Abstract ( )
  • With the advancement of globalization, international talent mobility is becoming increasingly frequent, and competition among countries for scientific and technological (S&T) talents is growing ever more intense. Talent serves as a vital pillar and intellectual resource for the construction of the Belt and Road (B&R) initiative. However, cooperation in S&T talents between China and countries along the B&R is still at an early stage, with issues such as low levels of collaboration, incomplete mechanisms, and weak two-way interaction. This study proposes three research questions: (1) What is the current status and development of S&T talent mobility between China and countries along the B&R? (2) Has the introduction of the B&R affected the S&T talent mobility between China and countries along the B&R? (3) What is the heterogeneity of the policy effects generated by the B&R Initiative? To address those research questions, using scientific big data provided by the Scopus database, this study identifies over 950,000 international S&T talent mobility events related to the institutions in China mainland. By employing descriptive analysis, social network analysis, and difference-in-differences models, this study analyzes the current status and historical evolution of the S&T talent mobility between China and 64 countries along the B&R. The study also evaluates whether and how the B&R initiative enhances the S&T talent mobility between China and these countries. After the initiation of the B&R initiative, there has been a noticeable improvement in the positioning of the B&R countries in the ego-centered network of China's international S&T talent mobility. The initiative has not exacerbated the "Matthew Effect" in the S&T talent mobility between these countries and China, thus contributing to a more balanced development. Signing cooperation agreements for jointly building the B&R facilitates the promotion of talent mobility between B&R countries and China. Strengthening scientific cooperation between B&R countries and China enhances the impact of the initiative on S&T talent mobility. The findings provide a reference for optimizing the interaction of the S&T talent between China and the B&R countries and enhancing China's participation efficiency in global scientific and technological governance. The findings of this study have important implications. When promoting the interaction of S&T talents between China and countries along the B&R, it is necessary to consider regional differences and development trends due to varying geopolitical factors as well as differences in national economic and technological strengths. Countries in South Asia along the region such as Pakistan and India are showing an increasing trend in both absolute numbers and relative shares of S&T talent mobility with China. This indicates that countries in South Asia along the B&R have significant potential for development in science, technology, and talent cooperation with China. Specific and feasible measures should be taken when advancing the interaction of S&T talents between China and countries along the B&R, such as leveraging specific platforms and projects to amplify the policy effects of the initiative. Furthermore, research cooperation between China and countries along the B&R acts as a catalyst in enhancing the policy effects of the initiative. By addressing technological challenges in key areas and global scientific issues closely related to human societal needs, strengthening research cooperation between China and countries along the B&R facilitates interactive exchanges of knowledge, information, resources, and scientific talents.
  • Data-driven Science of Science: Review on Research of Domestic Theoretical Science of Science (2017-2023)
  • 2025 Vol. 43 (3): 514-522.
  • Abstract ( )
  • In the current era of digital intelligence, the data-intensive disciplinary paradigm has facilitated the rise of data- and computation-driven research in Science of Science (SoS). The increasing abundance of big data in sciences and powerful data analytics has brought unprecedented development opportunities and challenges to SoS. Based on a review of the domestic literature in the last five years in meta-research on SoS and theoretical SoS, the latest research progress in SoS is explored. It is found that the current domestic meta-research on SoS mainly focuses on the change of the research paradigm as well as the construction and development of the disciplines of SoS.The research paradigm of SoS in China goes through four stages: speculation, mathematical statistics, scientific knowledge mapping, and SoS under digital intelligence. In terms of construction and development of the disciplines, the discipline of SoS is now in the second spring, after the first spring, a cold winter, and the renaissance. Theoretical sciences research focuses on the law of scientific development,scientists' career, and the mode of scientific collaboration.For scientific development, the recombination and integration of knowledge units is one of the key drivers of scientific development and scientific innovation. The flourishing of scientific development and the emergence of new large-scale scientific achievements are necessary conditions. Regarding the scientists' career, there are three paths in domestic research: the portrayal and regularization of the academic rhythms of a scientist's life, the drawing of academic genealogy of scientists, and combing and summarizing scientists' thoughts. Domestic research on scientific collaboration can be divided into three areas: collaboration behavior, collaboration influencing factors, and collaboration network structure and evolution. When it comes to collaboration behavior, Chinese scientists are more cooperative-centric than foreign scientists. In terms of collaboration influencing factors, scientific cooperation has differences in individual attributes (gender, age, culture/ethnicity), address attributes (institution, geography, international collaboration), professional attributes (subject area, knowledge background), and relational attributes (cooperation members, cooperation network). In terms of collaboration network structure and evolution, there are weak, strong, and super-relationships among scientists. In the face of new development opportunities, the real problems that need to be solved in China's SoS research mainly include insufficient theoretical systems, insufficiently perfect big data infrastructure construction, and insufficiently mature research paradigms. With the arrival of the era of digital intelligence, China's SoS needs to return to the tradition of Bernard's science and achieve a breakthrough in the research paradigm. The development of SoS should change from discipline-oriented to problem- and demand-oriented, and continuously promote the high-quality development of society and economy.
  • A Study on the Norms of Responsibility in the Technological Ethics Governance System
  • 2025 Vol. 43 (3): 523-529.
  • Abstract ( )
  • Responsible governance and responsible innovation are fundamental issues in the governance of technological ethics. The norms of responsibility within this governance framework are prerequisites for improving the overall system of technological ethics governance. These norms serve to constrain human innovation activities, ensuring they meet the expectations of an ethically conscious society. The framework aims to realize the vision of good governance, starting from the basic premise of defining ethical boundaries for technology activities centered on benevolence. By achieving a consensus on collaborative construction and shared responsibility, the framework further shapes a network of responsibility that is guided by human-centric technological principles. Based on this, higher requirements for the implementation of responsibility in governance processes and methods are proposed. Therefore, systematic recommendations are put forward from the value level, institutional level, subject level, and safeguard level, with the aim of constructing and perfecting the norms of responsibility in the technological ethics governance system.
  • Ideological Trend of New Technological Revolution in China: taking《The Third Wave》book for example
  • 2025 Vol. 43 (3): 538-547.
  • Abstract ( )
  • In the 1980s, with the emergence of the new technological revolution in the world, futurology works represented by the Third Wave were introduced into China through Sino-foreign cultural exchanges. Because of his advanced prediction of information civilization, the central leadership is thinking about the direction of China's economic development. In order to meet the challenges of the world's new technological revolution, the CPC Central Committee launched a nationwide discussion on countermeasures to the new technological revolution. The Third Wave and other works on futurology also continued to sell well in this discussion. The dissemination of this ideological trend of new technological revolution actually opened the process for all sectors of society to fully understand the social and economic development mode of developed countries from the perspective of information civilization, and provided important ideological enlightenment for the development of China's information technology industry in the following 40 years.
  • Collaboration topic mining for organized university-industry-research synergy innovation
  • 2025 Vol. 43 (3): 548-559.
  • Abstract ( )
  • Organized industry-university-research (IUR) collaboration is crucial for leveraging China's new national system advantages, enhancing the overall efficacy of the national innovation system, and achieving deep integration of industry, university, and research. Identifying collaboration topics is paramount for high-quality, efficient synergy in such collaborations and constitutes a primary challenge. This paper proposes a set of identification methods for IUR collaboration topic pairs based on complex network analysis and deep learning algorithms. Firstly, this paper analyzes the concept of "Organized IUR Synergy Innovation" and related topic features, proposes that the topic of IUR collaboration should be high-value and strong-relevance. Secondly, a bi-layer network of "science keywords-universities and research institutions" and a bi-layer network of "technology keywords-enterprises" are constructed based on paper data and patent data. The SciBERT model is used to construct a semantic network of science keywords and a semantic network of technology keywords. The Node2vec-based link prediction model is used to generate the future semantic network of science keywords and the semantic network of technology keywords. Then, the five indicators of novelty, fundamentality, width, growth, and foresight are measured using methods of complex network topology analysis, community discovery, and machine learning, to identify high-value scientific and technological topics. Finally, the correlation between scientific and technological topics is calculated using the improved semantic similarity index, SimDoc. This enables the selection of “science-technology topic pairs” that exhibit high potential for collaboration across IUR. In this paper, an empirical study is conducted using paper and patent data in the field of “artificial intelligence (AI)” from 2018 to 2022 to validate the research method and results. This study identifies 20 high-value scientific and technological topics in the field of AI. The results reveal that scientific topics focused more on basic theoretical research such as neural network training algorithms, human-computer interaction methods, and large model training algorithms, while technological topics focused more on application research such as computer vision technologies, computing devices, and big data processing techniques. The correlation analysis results between scientific and technological topics show that the overall correlation is above 0.5, and there are 22 science-technology topic pairs with scores of 0.9 or above, indicating that organized IUR synergy innovation in the AI field has a good foundation. The primary theoretical contributions are as follows. First, integrating the concept of "organization" into the design of an efficient IUR collaborative system, deepening the theoretical research on IUR synergy innovation. Second, expanding the application of complex network analysis and deep learning algorithms in the field of IUR synergy innovation research. Third, the integration of machine learning and text semantic analysis methods provides a useful supplement for deep mining of the intrinsic relationships between IUR cooperation topics. Fourth, enriching the theoretical and methodological research in areas such as optimizing the allocation of innovative resources and transforming scientific and technological achievements. This study can provide important decision-making support for government departments to guide enterprises, universities, and research institutes to carry out high-level IUR collaborative innovation in an organized manner, and play an important quantitative supporting role in promoting the deep integration of the innovation chain and industrial chain in practice.
  • Research on the Promotion Path of Regional Innovation Efficiency: From the Perspective of Functional View
  • 2025 Vol. 43 (3): 560-570.
  • Abstract ( )
  • Efficient regional innovation system is the key to improve the overall efficiency of national innovation system. Based on the functional perspective of innovation system, this paper constructs a theoretical model of innovation system efficiency in district construction of "subject-environment", and analyzes the improvement path of regional innovation system efficiency during the 13th Five-Year Plan period. The results show that a single condition cannot form high efficiency or low efficiency of regional innovation system. Through the interaction between subjects and environmental functions, three types of efficiency improvement paths are constructed: inclusive entrepreneurial innovation system, financial service innovation system and technological self-circulation innovation system. Among them, inclusive entrepreneurial innovation systems include middle and low-end labor-intensive entrepreneurial regional innovation systems and internal circulation production-intensive entrepreneurial regional innovation systems; Financial service-oriented innovation system includes two types: self-circulating financial regional innovation system and export-oriented financial service regional innovation system. In the future, we should focus on improving the efficiency of the regional innovation system, building a regional innovation system according to local conditions, promoting entrepreneurship, strengthening financial support for innovation and enhancing scientific and technological research capabilities.
  • The policy orchestration and realization path of catch-up mission-oriented innovation
  • 2025 Vol. 43 (3): 571-583.
  • Abstract ( )
  • China is currently facing significant challenges due to a technological blockade that hinders its progress towards becoming a leading innovator. Catch-up oriented innovation is a type of mission-oriented innovation (MOI), which is the key way for China to solve the “jamming” problem and realize self-reliant self-improvement science and technology. This paper integrates the theories of policy particles and resource orchestration, constructs the research framework of “policy orchestration- triple chain coordination- catch-up MOI”, reveals the inherent laws of the realization of catch-up MOI in different stages, and chooses mobile communication industry in China to carry out case tests. The results show that at different stages of CMOI, differentiated policy orchestration and triple-chain coordination are necessary to play an effective driving role. Firstly, the industrial catch-up process has prioritized a phase characterized by original imitation, with the government paying particular attention to the bridging policy orchestration. This involves the deconstruction of existing policy structures to address identified shortcomings and improve the coherence and effectiveness of the policy landscape. The government strengthens cooperation within the chain through bridging policy orchestration, forms a chain coordination mode of triple chains solo defence, enhances the basic strength and ensures the capability of the industry. Secondly, the industry enters the “curve acceleration” catch-up stage, with the government paying particular attention to the mash-up policy orchestration. This involves expanding the governance space and path of the original policy area through policy particle deconstruction, and strengthening the auxiliary coordination of innovation chain and service chain. The formation of an accompanying chain coordination mode dominated by the industrial chain, supported by the innovation chain and the service chain, is formed to accelerate the existing technological innovation of the industry. This approach helps to enhance the industrial technology foundation strength and basic support capacity of the industrial chain as a whole. This enables the focal industry chain to reduce the risks associated with research and development, overcome obstacles to innovation, and accelerate technological progress along the existing technological path of the industry. Finally, the industry enters the “parallel overtaking” catch-up phase, with the government paying particular attention to the integrated policy orchestration. This integrated policy orchestration contributes to the formation of a new variant of “all-in-one” policy. Through the integrated policy orchestration, the triple chains are interactively dominant, further forming a chain coordination mode of triple chains ensemble symbiosis, jointly surpassing the lead, and finally realizing the whole process of CMOI. The preceding analyses and conclusions provide further inspiration for the following: Firstly, the government should implement a strategy of gradual coordination of the triple chains through the continuous improvement of MOIP, with the ultimate goal of achieving CMOI. It is essential to recognize the varying stages of catching up with the industry, including the original imitation ,curve acceleration, and parallel overtaking. Furthermore, the policies should be optimized according to the mission intention of each stage, enhancing the effectiveness of the policies. Secondly, the government should adopt a policy particle approach to overcome path dependence, ensuring dynamic alignment with the desired direction, precise focus on the mission, optimal policy impact, enhanced efficiency in addressing the core issues of the triple chains, and improved policy quality and effectiveness. Ultimately, the government must persist in the reinforcement of the industrial, innovation, and service chains, thereby fostering synergies and coordination among the chains and optimizing the internal and external resource allocation of the triple chains to expedite the realization of CMOI.
  • How to build digital platform capabilities in manufacturing enterprises: Based on the perspective of "digital-business" capability integration
  • 2025 Vol. 43 (3): 584-593.
  • Abstract ( )
  • Building internal platforms has become an important approach for supplier enterprises to achieve digital transformation. However, the process of integrating external digital capabilities with internal business capabilities to form digital platform capabilities has not been fully revealed. By analyzing the longitudinal case studies of five leading supplier enterprises that have built internal platforms, this study reveals the construction path and formation mechanism of digital platform capabilities. The research findings are as follows: (1) Digital platform capabilities followed the construction path of "platform foundational capability - platform application capability - platform composite capability," demonstrating an advancing characteristic of "horizontal expansion - vertical enhancement"; (2) and form corresponding capabilities at each stage through three integration mechanisms of "transplantation - debugging - embedding"; (3) with the mechanism of "spatial-cross domain-structural" integration, the digital and business capabilities promote the formation and progression of the digital platform capabilities. The conclusions open the "black box" of digital platform capability formation, enrich and expand the relevant literature on capability construction and integration in platform contexts, and have guiding significance for manufacturing enterprises to accelerate digital transformation through building internal platforms.
  • Analysis of global scientific research contributions based on engagement, promotion and leadership
  • 2025 Vol. 43 (3): 594-607.
  • Abstract ( )
  • In recent years, China's achievements in the field of science and technology have attracted widespread global attention. In order to more accurately judge China's current international scientific status and clarify the scientific research contributions of major countries around the world, this article adopts bibliometric methods and uses the Web of Science core collection (including SCI-E and SSCI) database to analyze three perspectives: engagement, promotion and leadership. These perspectives are measured using four indicators: Global Research Engagement, Global Research Leadership, Global Research Promotion and Global Research Contribution. A systematic comparative analysis was conducted between China and major countries around the world. The results show that in terms of engagement, the United States has consistently held the top position, and China has the fastest growth rate and has now become the most important player in the world. In terms of promotion, the United States has always maintained a lead, but China has made rapid progress in the past two decades and now competes on par with the United States. The high-quality research results from the United States have attracted widespread attention worldwide, while the high-quality research outcomes in China receive more attention from domestic scholars. In terms of leadership, the United States has long dominated, while China is rapidly catching up though its overall strength is still relatively weak. In terms of overall scientific research contribution, the scientific research status of traditional scientific research powers such as the United States, the United Kingdom, and Germany is still in the leading position, while China's growth momentum is strong. The United States holds the top position across all time periods, reflecting its powerful dominant role in global scientific research. The relative changes in the scientific research contributions of major countries reflect the diversified development trend of each country's status and role in the field of scientific and technological innovation. It also indicates that the global scientific and technological landscape will be further reconstructed in the future, and China is expected to become a major contributor to the world's scientific research. In the past, certain research reports, relying on selectively chosen data, tended to exaggerate China's progress and may have prematurely concluded that China had surpassed the United States. However, there is still a certain gap between China and the United States at present. Given this reality, China should: 1) enhance collaboration in scientific research with other countries and international organizations to promote the sharing of knowledge and technology. 2) increase efforts in cultivating research talent to elevate the overall competence of researchers. 3) raise investment in research funding to support basic research and innovative projects. 4) establish a mechanism for rewarding research achievements to stimulate the enthusiasm and creativity of researchers. 5) establishing sound ethical norms for research and reinforcing ethical education for researchers. This study has some limitations: It relied solely on paper data; The research did not conduct a discipline-specific analysis. In future research, exploring a wider array of data types and concentrating on specific disciplines could enhance the precision of evaluating research contributions from different countries.
  • Analysing the Power Diffusion Situation under the Development of Artificial Intelligence and Responding to the Challenges
  • 2025 Vol. 43 (3): 608-616.
  • Abstract ( )
  • Advanced and emerging technologies enable the decentralization of decision-making across politics, economy, and society. This establishes a robust technical foundation and material conditions for power flow and diffusion. Artificial intelligence (AI), a hallmark of the fourth industrial revolution, possesses technical characteristics enabling dual military-civilian use, rapid change cycles, and easy dissemination. These characteristics make AI tend to cause technology spillovers. Based on the continuous expansion of the generation gap of artificial intelligence technology, technology will change the trend of power flow and diffusion in the process of deep mutual embedding with power, bringing a series of global governance problems.Based on its empowerment tendencies, this paper analyses horizontal power competition and vertical power conflicts arising from AI progress. It seeks to prepare institutional and theoretical frameworks for future human-machine symbiosis and co-governance facilitated by generative AI and proposes a global governance strategy guided by the triple logic of power-problem governance.
  • Research on the Impact of Urban-rural Gap and Media Use on Trust in Scientific Research Institutions
  • 2025 Vol. 43 (3): 642-650.
  • Abstract ( )
  • All over the world, various types of media place special emphasis on quoting expert discourse when interpreting policies and popularizing scientific knowledge, aiming to achieve better dissemination effects. However, the current resistance to expert advice on social media reflects the credibility crisis facing the expert community. An expert system refers to a system organized and embedded by experts. Specifically, scientific research institutions such as universities, research institutes, and other institutions can be regarded as types of expert systems. Compared to the expert community, relatively stable scientific research institutions serve as the institutional basis for the production and dissemination of professional knowledge. So, in the current public discourse space, has the disconnection between the ‘expert community’ and ‘public opinion’ affected expert systems represented by research institutions? Based on data from the 2021 China General Social Survey (CGSS), this study explores the impact of urban-rural differences and media use on trust in research institutions. The CGSS survey questions cover data on current place of residence, frequency of media use, media trust, trust in research institutions, etc., which align closely with the issues of interest in this study. Since 2003, CGSS has conducted 11 surveys, demonstrating temporal continuity. However, the variable of media usage frequency in this study may exhibit different behaviors across different time frames due to the passage of time and the development of media technology. In order to ensure that the research has the greatest explanatory power for reality, we have chosen the latest survey results for our study. The CGSS 2021 survey data was publicly released on March 31, 2023, and represents the latest public outcome of the CGSS survey. Empirical results analysis shows that rural residents have higher trust in research institutions than urban residents; internet usage frequency is significantly negatively correlated with trust in research institutions; television usage frequency has a significant positive impact on trust in research institutions; television and internet usage frequency moderate the urban-rural differences in trust in research institutions, with an increase in television usage frequency enhancing trust in research institutions among rural residents, while an increase in internet usage frequency weakens trust in research institutions among rural residents. The article discusses the potential reasons for the above results and proposes suggestions on how to effectively communicate science to urban and rural residents. Based on the research results, this paper suggests that research institutions, in promoting the dissemination of scientific popularization information, should prioritize public welfare, deeply understand the actual needs of the audience, select appropriate media channels to address urban-rural differences, and develop targeted scientific communication strategies. Scientific communication should also be vigilant against phenomena such as pseudoscience and pseudo-experts in the Internet environment and guard against the broken window effect caused by the Internet. The contribution of this paper lies in starting from the trust in scientific research institutions, which has been less explored in previous studies, to explore how the urban-rural residents and their media usage affect their trust in scientific research institutions in China, helping to clarify the current state of scientific trust and pave the way for establishing a “positive trust mechanism”.
  • Anomie of Science and Technology News Content in China: Hazards, Causes and Governance
  • 2025 Vol. 43 (3): 661-670.
  • Abstract ( )
  • Science and technology news builds a bridge for communication between science and society, and it serves as an important vehicle for encouraging scientific spirit and responding to public concerns about science. With the development of social media and digital technology, the anomie of science and technology news content is occurring with increasing frequency, which hinders public understanding of science and is not conducive to long-term development of S&T innovation. Hence, it is imperative to investigate the factors contributing to the generation and propagation of S&T fake news, as well as the mechanisms for its regulation. Drawing on Stuart Hall's encoding/decoding theory, this study examines the causes of fake news from the perspective of S&T news production and consumption. The analysis reveals four types of distortion in S&T information: (1) distortion resulting from the utilitarian encoding practice conducted by certain scientists, (2) distortion stemming from the asymmetry between the position of science community and that of the media, (3) distortion caused by the utilitarian encoding practice conducted by the media, and (4) distortion arising from the asymmetry between the position of the media and that of the audience. Furthermore, this study analyzes the existing policies and mechanisms regulating S&T news in China, and three deficiencies are identified: (1) Lack of authoritative oversight from the scientific community; (2) Regulation policies of science and technology news are insufficiently effective;(3) Reviewing online science and technology news presents certain difficulties. Based on the findings above, this study puts forward recommendations for establishing an ecosystem of S&T news production and consumption that upholds the truth: (1) Establish a robust regulatory framework for combating misinformation in science and technology news. (2) Bridge the asymmetry in science news production and consumption.
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