About LSAY > Staff
Staff Index
Jon Miller, Director
Linda Kimmel, Associate Director
Bianca Espinoza, Research Technician
Jon Miller, Director
For a full resume, click here.
Jon Miller is the Director of the International Center for the Advancement of Scientific Literacy (ICASL) in the Institute for Social Research (ISR) at the University of Michigan. Jon has measured the public understanding of science and technology in the United States for the last three decades, and has examined the factors associated with the development of attitudes toward science and science policy. He directed biennial national surveys for the National Science Board for 20 years, the results of which were reported in Science and Engineering Indicators. He has pioneered the definition and measurement of scientific literacy and his approach to the public understanding of science has been replicated in more than 40 countries. He continues to conduct studies of the public perception of science in the United States and other nations.
Jon is the Director of the Longitudinal Study of American Youth (LSAY), now located in the Institute for Social Research at University of Michigan. The LSAY began in 1987 with national samples of 7th and 10th grade public school students and has followed these students for the last two decades. The LSAY data base is one of the longest longitudinal studies of students and young adults in the United States.
Jon has published four books - Citizenship in an Age of Science (Pergamon Press, 1980), The American People and Science Policy (Pergamon Press, 1983); Public Perceptions of Science and Technology: A comparative study of the European Union, the United States, Japan, and Canada (Foundation BBV, Madrid, 1997); and Biomedical Communications: Purposes, audiences, and strategies (Academic Press, 2001) - and more than 50 journal articles and book chapters. He is a member of the Editorial Board of the journal Public Understanding of Science.
Jon is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and recently completed his second six-year term on the AAAS Committee on the Public Understanding of Science and Technology. He was a Sigma Xi National Lecturer for two years between 1989 and 1991.
Jon's expertise in the measurement and analysis of the public understanding of science and technology is recognized internationally. He served as President of the International Council for the Comparative Study of the Public Understanding of Science and Technology for six years. He has served as a consultant to the European Commission, the National Institute of Science and Technology Policy in Japan, and the China Association for Science and Technology.
Linda Kimmel, Associate Director
For a full resume, click here.
Linda Kimmel is Associate Director of the International Center for the Advancement of Scientific Literacy and Associate Director of the Longitudinal Study of American Youth (LSAY) in the Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan. Linda has worked with Professor Miller for the last twenty years on the measurement of the public understanding of science and technology and on the factors associated with the development of attitudes toward and an understanding of science and technology. She is particularly interested in issues concerning the information acquisition behaviors of women.
Linda has worked extensively in the management of complex data file systems and in the analysis of longitudinal data. She has conducted workshops in the coding of complex responses, scale construction, and structural equation modeling. She has trained and supervised numerous graduate students and undergraduate students in methodological issues related to survey research, and cross-sectional and longitudinal studies.
Linda is co-author of Biomedical Communications (2001) with Professor Miller. She is the author or co-author of journal articles covering a range of issues from gender differences in attitudes toward animal research and nuclear power to scale development.
Bianca Espinoza, Research Technician
Bianca Espinoza joined the LSAY staff in August of 2010, as a Research Technician. Bianca has a Bachelor's of Science in Sociology and Psychology from Michigan State University, and is currently taking graduate classes at the University of Michigan in the Program in Survey Methodology. She is the first point of contact for most LSAY participants, and manages the distribution of the yearly LSAY questionnaires. Bianca works directly with the University of Michigan students who help the LSAY with participant tracking, correspondence, and data collection.