Filter by keyword: Digital science communication

An increasing number of government science organizations are inserting humour into their informational messages on social media. However, since individuals may expect government agencies to communicate in a more formal and traditional manner, does the use of humour influence perceptions of the organization? This study examines how humorous messages regarding three different wildlife science issues (climate change, human-wildlife interaction, and human-caused wildfires) influences perceived expertise, trustworthiness, and likability through parallel mediators, expectancy violation magnitude and the valence of that violation. Overall, results showed a significant, negative effect of humour on perceptions of the organization through the two mediators. However, these results varied slightly across issues. Government science organizations should be wary of making abrupt shifts in their tone on social media to avoid unpleasantly surprising their audiences in these spaces. Implications for future research regarding science humour and social media practice are discussed.

Social media made a huge transition in science communication during the public health crises. Social media amplified the audience communication effect of popular science short videos and played a positive role in containing epidemics and stabilizing social sentiment. The purpose of this article is to investigate the effective communication and alignment mechanism of popular science short videos on social media. Applying grounded theory and combining case studies with interviews, this article investigates the factors that influence the effective communication of popular science short videos on social media platforms in China during public health crises. The research identifies audience demand, content quality, platform diversity, and media matrix integration as key factors driving effective communication during public health crises. This study attempts to thoroughly examine the communication process of popular science short videos and propose further suggestions for the future development of popular science media.

TikTok has become an increasingly important platform for communication, yet it remains understudied in science communication research. This commentary addresses this gap by discussing findings from an exploratory interview study with social scientists who actively communicate about science on TikTok. Drawing on in-depth, semi-structured interviews and one author's platform experience, we examine the types of hostility researchers encounter and how they cope with criticism and harassment in their digital public engagement. A central and counter-intuitive finding is that participants often normalise, and sometimes value negative responses as these inspire content, provoke discussion, and boost engagement. Thus, hostility is reframed as a form of communicative capital. This dynamic exemplifies the “Engagement Paradox,” defined here as the tension in which negative feedback simultaneously acts as validation and as a strategic resource to enhance visibility. We conclude by discussing how the infrastructural arrangements of platforms and their political-economic foundations shape science communication and highlight the norms they (re)create amid the post-normal conditions of science communication.

In this commentary, we examine patterns of attacks against scholars focusing on the case of Germany. Drawing on the responses to open and closed questions in a recent survey of 2,600 German researchers, we identify context- and field-specific patterns of science hostility. While most responding researchers do not experience severe attacks, those engaged in specific fields may be at a higher risk of being threatened. We argue that attacks on researchers may not be perceived as acts of hostility against scientific institutions but rather emerge in the context of controversial topics. By drawing from material of open-ended questions, we provide context of such controversial topics in Germany. Our results suggest that these topics are disputed not only in public forums, but also in academic contexts — and not always appropriately. Such controversies both affect and transcend higher education institutions, as attacks can also originate from researchers themselves. Furthermore, our material suggests that scholars are concerned about how expertise is, or should be, represented in these contexts, and about how deliberation on these topics on campus can be upheld.

The commentary diagnoses a structural contradiction: policy, institutions, and funders often encourage outward-facing activity while outsourcing its risks to individual scholars or external institutions. Integrating interviews with climate change researchers (N=13) as a case study alongside selected scholarship (without claiming completeness), we document how institutional reputation can overshadow researcher-centered support, how training often underaddresses emotional and security burdens, and how assistance can wane when harassment escalates. While various studies — including our own — still point to inadequate support structures, there is a wide range of services on offer that could prove effective in the long term. We elaborate on some of these in more detail, with a particular focus on Germany as the authors' (academic) home country.

This report presents an analysis of the communication efforts of the XXXII International Astronomical Union General Assembly, the first held on the African continent. For the first time in its history, the conference provided a fully streamed, open access experience on YouTube, complemented by a robust, multi-platform social media outreach campaign. Through metrics analysis and survey results, our study evaluates the effectiveness of diverse digital initiatives in enhancing engagement on different social media platforms to democratise scientific discourse. These findings offer critical insights for future hybrid and virtual conferences, providing social media metrics, best practices analysis and evaluation for social media scientific global communication of large-scale scientific gatherings.

Audiovisual communication methods such as digital storytelling can reach wide audiences to realise greater societal research impact. Increasingly, researchers embrace (or are expected to embrace) these approaches but often lack relevant skills. This paper draws on Horizon Europe-funded research where digital stories were developed in 20 European regions. Findings from a survey completed by the researchers highlight skills- and engagement-based challenges and explore how capacity to develop digital stories was built. The paper focuses on the role of digital storytelling in science communication, and the challenges researchers face in developing these outputs, including in ensuring meaningful participant involvement and the authentic representation of participants' voices within the final narratives. We discuss how to better support researchers to embrace digital storytelling as a science communication method, with recommendations for effective research impact.

AI-based chatbots offer new opportunities for communicating science-based information, but often fall short of established standards. We conducted two pre-registered experiments examining user perceptions of an AI-based chatbot providing information on nanoparticles in sunscreen. Study one (N = 508) tested whether a disclaimer about the chatbot's uncertain training data affected perceived source trustworthiness and information credibility. The results showed no significant effect of the disclaimer; perceptions were primarily influenced by users' prior attitudes. Study two (N = 1059) tested the evaluation of information on nanoparticles in sunscreen in an experiment with a 2 (source: scientist vs. AI-based chatbot) ×2 (presentation: static vs. dynamic) between-subjects design. The study showed that the scientist was evaluated as more trustworthy and the provided information seen as more credible compared to the AI-based chatbot. The two studies highlight the relevance of perceived objectivity in science and health communication, whether executed by humans or machines.

Multimodality in science communication has increased with the rise of digital communication affordances. Digital platforms enable greater integration of modes — text, visuals, and sound — within single messages. We argue that multimodality is particularly crucial for contested scientific issues, where viral spread, emotional persuasiveness, and personalisation are significant. We review empirical evidence and propose future research directions, thereby contributing to science communication in contested environments by examining the role of multimodality.

With the widespread use of AI-generated content (AIGC) on social media, its potential to spread misinformation poses threats to the public. Although AI disclosure is widely promoted as a transparency measure to prompt critical evaluation, its effectiveness in science communication remains controversial. This study conducted a within-subjects experiment (N = 433) to examine how AI disclosure affects perceived credibility of science communication texts and the moderating roles of readers' negative attitudes towards AI and audience involvement. The experiment manipulated AI disclosure labels and information veracity. The results revealed a truth-falsity crossover effect: AI disclosure significantly reduced the perceived credibility of correct information while unexpectedly increasing the perceived credibility of misinformation. Negative attitudes towards AI significantly moderated these effects, whereas audience involvement exerted only limited influence. These findings highlight the complex and sometimes counterproductive consequences of AI disclosure in science communication and suggest implications for cue-based processing, algorithm aversion, and the design of disclosure mechanisms.