Scientific Conferences and the Communication of Enlightenment

Abstract

As institutional practices for the efficient transmission of enlightenment, scientific conferences carry structural liabilities preventing them from maximizing the task performance for which they were constituted. An example is presented of an international conference, and Q methodology is employed to demonstrate the intellectual themes implicit among those in attendance. Examples are provided of the ways in which the results from the Q study could be used to facilitate the conference's intellectual mission by focusing on the already existing schemata of the participants.