Volume 18 • Issue 05 • 2019 • Special Issue: Stories in Science Communication, 2019
Oct 14, 2019

Volume 18 • Issue 05 • 2019 • Special Issue: Stories in Science Communication, 2019

There is a renewed interest amongst science communication practitioners and scholars to explore the potential of storytelling in public communication of science, including to understand how science storytelling functions (or could fail) in different contexts. Drawing from storytelling as the core theme of the 2018 conference of the Public Communication of Science and Technology (PCST) Network, we present a selection of papers, essays and practice insights that offer diverse perspectives. Some contributions focus on the cultural and structural qualities of science stories and its key success factors, while others explore new formats, platforms and collaborators in science storytelling activities.

Editorials

Oct 14, 2019 Editorial
Storytelling: the soul of science communication

by Marina Joubert, Lloyd Davis and Jenni Metcalfe

There is a renewed interest amongst science communication practitioners and scholars to explore the potential of storytelling in public communication of science, including to understand how science storytelling functions (or could fail) in different contexts. Drawing from storytelling as the core theme of the 2018 conference of the Public Communication of Science and Technology (PCST) Network, we present a selection of papers, essays and practice insights that offer diverse perspectives. Some contributions focus on the cultural and structural qualities of science stories and its key success factors, while others explore new formats, platforms and collaborators in science storytelling activities.

Volume 18 • Issue 05 • 2019 • Special Issue: Stories in Science Communication, 2019

Articles

Oct 14, 2019 Article
Science stories as culture: experience, identity, narrative and emotion in public communication of science

by Sarah Rachael Davies, Megan Halpern, Maja Horst, David Kirby and Bruce Lewenstein

The last three decades have seen extensive reflection concerning how science communication should be modelled and understood. In this essay we propose the value of a cultural approach to science communication — one that frames it primarily as a process of meaning-making. We outline the conceptual basis for this view of culture, drawing on cultural theory to suggest that it is valuable to see science communication as one aspect of (popular) culture, as storytelling or narrative, as ritual, and as collective meaning-making. We then explore four possible ways that a cultural approach might proceed: by mobilising ideas about experience; by framing science communication through identity work; by focusing on fiction; and by paying attention to emotion. We therefore present a view of science communication as always entangled within, and itself shaping, cultural stories and meanings. We close by suggesting that one benefit of this approach is to move beyond debates concerning ‘deficit or dialogue’ as the key frame for public communication of science.

Volume 18 • Issue 05 • 2019 • Special Issue: Stories in Science Communication, 2019

Oct 14, 2019 Article
The power of storytelling and video: a visual rhetoric for science communication

by Wiebke Finkler and Bienvenido Leon

This research develops a conceptual framework for telling visual stories about science using short-format videos, termed SciCommercial videos, that draw upon marketing communication. The framework is illustrated by an exemplar, the Good Whale Watching video, which is explained using a visual rhetoric keyframe analysis. Finally, the effectiveness of the video is evaluated as a science communication tool using an empirical online survey with 1698 respondents. The results highlight the benefits of using video for storytelling about science by using our framework formula, modified from marketing practices, to produce videos that are Simple, Unexpected, Concrete, Credible, Emotional, Science Storytelling (SUCCESS).

Volume 18 • Issue 05 • 2019 • Special Issue: Stories in Science Communication, 2019

Oct 14, 2019 Article
Telling it straight — a focus group study on narratives affecting public confidence in science

by Fredrik Brounéus, Maria Lindholm and Gustav Bohlin

Public confidence in research is important for scientific results to achieve societal impact. Swedish surveys suggest consistent but differing levels of confidence in different research areas. Thus, certain research-related factors can be assumed to have a decisive influence on confidence levels. This focus-group study explores the role of different narratives in shaping public confidence in research. Findings include four themes with potential to increase or decrease public confidence: Person, Process, Product and Presentation. The results offer insights as to how public confidence in research is formed and may give researchers agency in promoting confidence through their communication activities.

Volume 18 • Issue 05 • 2019 • Special Issue: Stories in Science Communication, 2019

Oct 14, 2019 Article
Students as storytellers: mobile-filmmaking to improve student engagement in school science

by Kaitlyn Martin, Lloyd Davis and Susan Sandretto

Student engagement is an important predictor of choosing science-related careers and establishing a scientifically literate society: and, worryingly, it is on the decline internationally. Conceptions of science are strongly affected by school experience, so one strategy is to bring successful science communication strategies to the classroom. Through a project creating short science films on mobile devices, students' engagement greatly increased through collaborative learning and the storytelling process. Teachers were also able to achieve cross-curricular goals between science, technology, and literacy. We argue that empowering adolescents as storytellers, rather than storylisteners, is an effective method to increase engagement with science.

Volume 18 • Issue 05 • 2019 • Special Issue: Stories in Science Communication, 2019

Practice Insights

Oct 14, 2019 Practice Insight
Telling stories in science communication: case studies of scholar-practitioner collaboration

by Michelle Riedlinger, Luisa Massarani, Marina Joubert, Ayelet Baram-Tsabari, Marta Entradas and Jenni Metcalfe

Reflecting on the practice of storytelling, this practice insight explores how collaborations between scholars and practitioners can improve storytelling for science communication outcomes with publics. The case studies presented demonstrate the benefits of collaborative storytelling for inspiring publics, promoting understanding of science, and engaging publics more deliberatively in science. The projects show how collaboration between scholars and practitioners [in storytelling] can happen across a continuum of scholarship from evaluation and action research to more critical thinking perspectives. They also show how stories of possible futures and community efficacy can support greater engagement of publics in evidence-informed policymaking. Storytelling in collaborations between scholars and practitioners involves many activities: combining cultural and scientific understandings; making publics central to storytelling; equipping scientists to tell their own stories directly to publics; co-creating stories; and retelling collaborative success stories. Collaborative storytelling, as demonstrated in these case studies, may improve the efficacy of science communication practice as well as its scholarship.

Volume 18 • Issue 05 • 2019 • Special Issue: Stories in Science Communication, 2019

Essays

Oct 14, 2019 Essay
Who doesn't love a good story? — What neuroscience tells about how we respond to narratives

by Craig Cormick

Can we really say what type of story has impact on us, and what type of story does not? Evidence suggests that we can. But we need to better understand the way that stories work on us, at a neural and empathetic level, and better understand the ways that the elements of stories, such as structure and metaphor work. By combining scientific research with the deeper wisdom of traditional storytelling we have both a deep knowledge married to scientific evidence — which can be very powerful tools for science communicators.

Volume 18 • Issue 05 • 2019 • Special Issue: Stories in Science Communication, 2019

Collections