ИСТИНА

Nowadays the most comprehensive mechanism for disseminating information about science is the system of school education. However, how important is its impact on the image of science and are people whose knowledge is limited to information from the school curriculum operate only with concepts and personalities from textbooks? This question is the main research problem in the framework of our study conducted in several schools of St. Petersburg (Russia). Moreover, the main issue was expanded by several indirect ones, that made it possible to include a number of additional factors, namely: the effectiveness of the state policy that is "emphasizing" the significance of Russian science, the influence of gender attitudes, etc. Thus, we tried to distinguish what schoolchildren considered significant from their a priori amorphous image of science. Further, we carried out a correlation analysis of student survey results and tables of content analysis, compiled on the federal basic school subjects’ textbooks. This allowed us to determine which of the significant elements penetrated into the consciousness of students from the school curriculum, and which came from outside. To estimate the effectiveness of state propaganda in the sphere of science, we differentiated the question of significant researchers and inventions on the basis of "citizenship", which allowed us to obtain separate lists of "domestic" and "foreign" sciences. As for the significance of gender, our hypothesis was not confirmed - the answers of boys and girls did not have significant statistical signs of difference.