Separate ways

 A few days ago, Andrew Gelman observed that views on scientific authority have become more politically polarized in over the last few decades.  This post will take a closer look at the timing.  The General Social Survey has a series of questions of the form "as far as the people running these institutions are concerned, would you say you have a great deal of confidence, only some confidence, or very little confidence at all in them."  One of the institutions they ask about is "the scientific community."  The average among self-rated liberals and conservatives (I leave moderates out in order to make the figure easier to read), with higher numbers indicating more confidence:  

The next figure shows the size of the gap (liberal minus conservative).  

There was no consistent difference in the 1970s and 1980s, but a gap emerged in the 1990s and grew gradually for several decades (see this paper by Gordon Gauchat for a detailed account), before growing dramatically in the last few years (the four most recent surveys are 2016, 2018, 2021, and 2022). 

The GSS also asked about "medicine."  The liberal and conservative means:  

No consistent difference until the last few surveys, when a substantial gap has emerged.  

The GSS also asks about confidence in education.  The liberal and conservative means:

The pattern is similar to "the scientific community":  a difference emerging in the 1990s and then growing gradually before increasing dramatically in the last few years.  

This pattern is not universal:  for example, the gap in confidence in business has been pretty constant since the 1970s, and the gap in confidence in organized labor has grown gradually.  The obvious explanation for the recent growth with science, medicine, and education is the response to Covid.  Will it persist or will things shift back to where they were previously?  There was another round of the GSS in 2024; the data will be released soon, which will at least provide the beginnings of an answer.