Browse all Publications

Filter by keyword: Science communication: theory and models

Publications including this keyword are listed below.

182 publications found

Nov 17, 2016 Article
Open Media Science

by Kristian Martiny, David Budtz Pedersen and Alfred Birkegaard

In this article, we present three challenges to the emerging Open Science (OS) movement: the challenge of communication, collaboration and cultivation of scientific research. We argue that to address these challenges OS needs to include other forms of data than what can be captured in a text and extend into a fully-fledged Open Media movement engaging with new media and non-traditional formats of science communication. We discuss two cases where experiments with open media have driven new collaborations between scientists and documentarists. We use the cases to illustrate different advantages of using open media to face the challenges of OS.

Volume 15 • Issue 06 • 2016

Oct 10, 2016 Letter
Communicating trust and trusting science communication ― some critical remarks

by Alan Irwin and Maja Horst

Written in response to a previous article by Weingart and Guenther [2016] in JCOM, this letter aims to open up some critical issues concerning the ‘new ecology of communication’. It is argued that this evolving ecology needs to be openly explored without looking back to a previous idyll of ‘un-tainted’ science.

Volume 15 • Issue 06 • 2016

Sep 21, 2016 Commentary
Mediated trust in science: concept, measurement and perspectives for the `science of science communication'

by Mike S. Schäfer

Trust in science is, to a considerable extent, the outcome of communication. News and online media in particular are important mediators of trust in science. So far, however, conceptual works on mediated trust in science are lacking. Taking a cue from Weingart & Guenther, this commentary proposes a concept of mediated trust in science and for its measurement, and shows where it could be used in the science of science communication.

Volume 15 • Issue 05 • 2016

Sep 21, 2016 Essay
An integrated model of science communication — More than providing evidence

by Nancy Longnecker

Factors that influence reception and use of information are represented in this koru model of science communication using the metaphor of a growing plant. Identity is central to this model, determining whether an individual attends to information, how it is used and whether access to it results in increased awareness, knowledge or understanding, changed attitudes or behaviour. In this koru model, facts are represented as nutrients in the soil; the matrix influences their availability. Communication involves reorganisation of facts into information, available via channels represented as roots. When information is taken up, engagement with it is influenced by external factors (social norms, support and control) and internal factors (values, beliefs, attitudes, awareness, affect, understanding, skills and behaviour) which affect whether the individual uses it to form new knowledge.

Volume 15 • Issue 05 • 2016

Sep 21, 2016 Commentary
Science communication and the issue of trust

by Peter Weingart and Lars Guenther

Science communication, whether internally or to the general public depends on trust, both trust in the source and trust in the medium of communication. With the new 'ecology of communication' this trust is endangered. On the one hand the very term of science communication has been captured by many different actors (e.g., governments, PR experts, universities and research institutions, science journalists, and bloggers) apart from scientists themselves to whom science communication means different things and whose communication is tainted by special interests. Some of these actors are probably more trusted by the general public than others. On the other hand, the channels that are used to communicate science are also not trusted equally. Particularly the widespread use of social media raises doubts about the credibility of the communication spread through them.

Volume 15 • Issue 05 • 2016

Sep 21, 2016 Editorial
Trust, advertising and science communication

by Emma Weitkamp

This issue of JCOM presents some interesting challenges relating to trust and the media ecology that supports science communication. Weingart and Guenther have organised a set of commentaries considering the issue of trust and media from different points of view, by asking for responses to their paper 'Science Communication and the Issue of Trust'. The commentaries focus on traditional and social media and the actors that contribute to media content, though they do not consider 'paid for' content (also known as advertising), which is the subject of a paper by Silva and Simonian also published in this issue of JCOM.

Volume 15 • Issue 05 • 2016

Jul 06, 2016 Letter
Is silence golden? Silence in interdisciplinary collaboration between scientists

by Nick Verouden and Maarten van der Sanden

In considering the ethos of science, Robert Merton [1973] posited that openness and secrecy reflect opposing values in the accomplishment of science. According to Merton, scientific inquiry required that all interested parties have access to and freely share scientific information. In our current epoch, this importance of openness in science seems even more widely accepted. It is a given nowadays that scientists are expected to work as part of a team, not only within their own department, but also with other departments different disciplines. To work interdisciplinary scientists must become more communicative and critically talk about difference, which asks maximum transparency and open communication of the participants. However, against the adage that openness and participation in science is an inherent good, one easily forgets that the actual practice of collaborating may also require things are not said. Navigating everyday interactional challenges may depend on postponing issues to keep the process going, for instance because scientists still have to figure out what they find important in the collaboration with others. But also issues like, withholding sensitive problems or not critiquing each other's options viewpoints, leaving points shrewdly of the agenda, and excluding relevant actors from the meeting table. Despite the idea of open innovation, shared visions, beliefs and knowledge we must focus on silence for the good and the bad as well.

Volume 15 • Issue 05 • 2016

Jun 09, 2016 Article
Democratizing science in the eighteenth century: resonances between Condorcet's Sketch (1795) and twenty-first century science communication

by Lindy A. Orthia

The twenty-first century has witnessed a shift in science communication ideals from one-way science popularization activities towards more reflexive, participatory approaches to public engagement with science. Yet our longue duéee histories of science communication's antecedents focus on the former and have neglected the latter. In this paper I identify parallels between modern science communication ideals and an iconic Enlightenment text, Condorcet's Sketch for a Historical Picture of the Progress of the Human Mind (1795). I show that Condorcet's carefully negotiated balance between scientific reason and radical principles of democracy has much in common with twenty-first century debates about science communication.

Volume 15 • Issue 04 • 2016

May 26, 2016 Letter
Reflections on ‘Listening and Empowering: children and science communication’ by Matteo Merzagora and Tricia Jenkins

by Frazer Swift

The letter compares and contrasts thinking about making science accessible and relevant to children in science centres and museums with thinking about communication in social history museums.

Volume 15 • Issue 04 • 2016

Mar 17, 2016 Essay
Towards a taxonomy for public communication of science activities

by María del Carmen Sánchez-Mora

As a result of the large number of media used and a variety of objectives pursued by the various Public Communication of Science (PCS) activities, their evaluation turns into a daunting task. Therefore, a general taxonomy for all the approaches used by PCS could be helpful in order to differentiate their effects and to measure their results. A general format is proposed for a fast and easy evaluation of PCS efforts and to share a common language with all science communicators, who need to easily compare the results of this growing activity.

Volume 15 • Issue 02 • 2016