Karolinska Institutet falls in reputation survey

For the second year running, Karolinska Institutet’s (KI’s) score in a reputation survey conducted by the research agency Kantar Sifo has fallen from 59 to 47, where 100 signifies an excellent reputation and 0 a weak reputation.

“It’s not at all good that the general public have low confidence in us. But at the same time this result was not entirely unexpected. KI has been going through a very turbulent period during which the Macchiarini case has overshadowed the university’s operations and activities and all the excellent research and education that have been going on here. We take the result most seriously and our focus is on continuing to proceed systematically with measures to rectify previous shortcomings,” says new Vice-Chancellor Ole Petter Ottersen in a comment on the survey.

Kantar Sifo agree that it is probably the turbulence in the media around Paolo Macchiarini that has had an impact and continues to do so this year. The survey also indicates that by far the most important channel for the general public to find information about KI is in fact the picture painted by the media and the survey’s respondents perceive the publicity given to the university as distinctly negative.

“When the public spotlight goes out, KI nevertheless has good prerequisites to recover – but the journey back will probably take time,” says Kantar Sifo opinion survey manager Toivo Sjörén.