1331 publications found
This study addresses an open question about science bloggers' self-perceived roles as science communicators. Previous research has investigated the roles science journalists see themselves engaging in, but such research has failed to capture the experiences of science bloggers as a broad and diverse group that is yet often very different in their practices from professional journalists. In this study, a survey of over 600 science bloggers reveals that on the broadest level, science bloggers see themselves engaging most often as explainers of science and public intellectuals. Perceived communication role depends predominantly on occupation, science communication training, blog affiliation and gender.
The ever-changing nature of academic science communication discourse can make it challenging for those not intimately associated with the field ― scientists and science-communication practitioners or new-comers to the field such as graduate students ― to keep up with the research. This collection of articles provides a comprehensive overview of the subject and serves as a thorough reference book for students and practitioners of science communication.
This paper reflects on the evaluation of and findings from a nationwide programme of physics engagement activities hosted by 10 science centres across the UK. We discuss our findings indicating the affordances of the programme with reference to the wider literature in order to draw out elements of the project that may be useful for other science learning and engagement initiatives. In particular, we discuss findings that relate to contemporary research and policy interests around the engagement of girls in science, the key ages at which young people’s views may best be influenced, the importance of explicating the nature of ‘real-world’ content and careers, and the value of collaborative partnerships.
Between 2010 and July 2015, a group of researchers at the Department of History and Philosophy of Science, University of Cambridge and the National Maritime Museum were engaged in an Arts & Humanities Research Council-funded project “The Board of Longitude 1714–1828: Science, innovation and empire in the Georgian world”. The project team included a dedicated Public Engagement Officer whose role was to engage audiences with the outputs of the research project.
The National Maritime Museum celebrated the 300 th anniversary of the 1714 Longitude Act with a major exhibition, Ships, Clocks & Stars: The Quest for Longitude, which told the story of the 18th century quest for longitude, alongside a series of longitude-themed events. To commemorate the same anniversary, NESTA launched the 2014 Longitude Prize, a challenge to find a solution to today’s equivalent of the longitude problem, with the problem chosen by a public vote. Using these two examples as a case study, I explore how history of science helps science communication organisations engage people with science, and vice versa.
Modern technology and innovation research needs to analyse and collect users’ requirements from the outset of the project’s design, according to the Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) approach. Bringing in new services without involving end-users in the whole research process does not make for optimal results in terms of scientific, technological and economic impact. This commentary reports on research experience of stakeholder involvement and co-production in Italy, implemented in Earth Observation downstream services at regional level. It reports the participative approach and method adopted and the impacts and benefits derived.
Access to high quality evaluation results is essential for science communicators to identify negative patterns of audience response and improve outcomes. However, there are many good reasons why robust evaluation linked is not routinely conducted and linked to science communication practice. This essay begins by identifying some of the common challenges that explain this gap between evaluation evidence and practice. Automating evaluation processes through new technologies is then explicated as one solution to these challenges, capable of yielding accurate real-time results that can directly feed into practice. Automating evaluation through smartphone and web apps tied to open source analysis tools can deliver on-going evaluation insights without the expense of regularly employing external consultants or hiring evaluation experts in-house. While such automation does not address all evaluation needs, it can save resources and equip science communicators with the information they need to continually enhance practice for the benefit of their audiences.
This commentary shares a personal ‘learning curve’ of a science communication researcher about the impact of (playful) tools and processes for inclusive deliberation on emerging techno-scientific topics in the contemporary era of two-way science and technology communication practices; needed and desired in responsible research and innovation (RRI) contexts. From macro-level impacts that these processes are supposed to have on research and innovation practices and society, as encouraged by the RRI community, the author discovers more about ‘micro-level’ impacts; through conversations with peers of her department Athena (VU University, Amsterdam), as well as through experiencing the SiP 2015 conference in Bristol. Based on that, she defines several ‘impact-spheres’: a modular set of flexibly defined micro-level impacts that events in RRI contexts can have on both academic and non-academic participants, with respect and relationship development as focal assets to aim for; individual (micro-)changes that potentially build up towards an ‘RRI world’.
The narrative method of presenting popular science method promises to extend the audience of science, but carries risks related to two broad aspects of story: the power of narrative to impose a compelling and easily interpretable structure on discrete events and the unpredictability and mystique associated with story.
In the past 25 years school-university partnerships have undergone a transition from ad hoc to strategic partnerships. Over the previous two-and-a-half-years we have worked in partnership with teachers and pupils from the Denbigh Teaching School Alliance in Milton Keynes, UK.
Our aims have been to encourage the Open University and local schools in Milton Keynes to value, recognise and support school-university engagement with research, and to create a culture of reflective practice.
Through our work we have noted a lack of suitable planning tools that work for researchers, teachers and pupils. Here we propose a flexible and adaptable metric to support stakeholders as they plan for, enact and evaluate direct and meaningful engagement between researchers, teachers and pupils. The objective of the metric is to make transparent the level of activity required of the stakeholders involved — teachers, pupils and researchers — whilst also providing a measure for institutions and funders to assess the relative depth of engagement; in effect, to move beyond the seductive siren of reach.
Taking the International Science in Popular Culture conference as a starting point, this editorial considers audiences for cultural products, considering the size of audiences (from blockbuster films, to intimate science slams), their pre-existing (or lack of pre-existing) interest in the subject and what this might offer the field of science communication.