Clinical and Translational Nutrition

Community and Public Health Nutrition

Global Nutrition

Nutrition Translation GEM Forum - When Nutrition Science Collides With Belief: Controversy, Identity, and Uncertainty in a Post-Trust Era

Chair(s)

• 

  Stephen Fleming, PhD (he/him/his)

  CEO
  Traverse Science, Inc.
  Mundelein, Illinois, United States

  Disclosure(s): Medifast, Inc.: Consultant (Ongoing)
  National Cattlemen’s Beef Association: Consultant (Ongoing)
  Soy Nutrition Institute Global: Consultant (Ongoing)
  Traverse Science: Executive Role (e.g. Board of Directors) (Ongoing); Stock Shareholder (excluding mutual funds) (Ongoing)

Co-Chair(s)

• 

  Andrea Lobene, PhD, RD, LD

  Assistant Professor
  Health, Nutrition, and Food Sciences
  Florida State University
  Tallahassee, Florida, United States

  Disclosure(s): No relevant financial relationship(s) with ineligible companies to disclose.

Speaker(s)

• 

  Andrew Brown, PhD (he/him/his)

  Associate Professor
  University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences and Arkansas Children's Research Institute
  Little Rock, Arkansas, United States

  Disclosure information not submitted.
• 

  Javier Granados Samayoa, PhD (he/him/his)

  Assistant Professor
  Texas Christian University
  Fort Worth, Texas, United States

  Disclosure(s): No relevant financial relationship(s) with ineligible companies to disclose.

Nutrition science is not contested only on evidence but on culture, values, identity, and perceived legitimacy. This session examines how scientific uncertainty is weaponized, controversies arise, and how belief systems influence which nutrition narratives "win."

Rather than treating misinformation as a deficit of knowledge, the panel explores it as a psychological, social, and structural phenomenon, asking what scientists must do differently in a world where trust is fragmented.