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1412 publications found

Mar 16, 2026 Commentary

Reshaping science communication in a critical period of disinformation and distrust

I was invited by my colleagues, Leßmöllmann and Medvecky, to participate in a set of commentaries on the role of science communication in the post-truth era, which will be published in the Journal of Science Communication. My reflection will focus on how reshaping and promoting official or governmental science communication could help minimise the impact of misinformation on science-related issues, such as climate change, vaccines and artificial intelligence, among others, in the public sphere. Although European and Western governments have increasingly embraced the integration of science communication as a structural and ethical component of their public information strategies, these efforts have mainly centred on fostering dissemination practices led by individual researchers or research teams. However, this approach often overlooks the equally critical role of institutional communication systems, which are incapable of translating scientific knowledge into clear, accessible and actionable information for the broader public. This omission becomes particularly salient during crises when citizens actively seek guidance grounded in scientific evidence and are frequently met with institutional silence, ambiguity or poorly coordinated messaging.

Volume 25 • Issue 1 • 2026

Mar 16, 2026 Commentary

Power, epistemic authority, and game theory

by Annette Leßmöllmann and Fabien Medvecky

Authoritarian populism as a political system is on the global rise. In (what was) Bolsonaro's Brazil, Orbán's Hungary, or Trump's U.S., it yielded or yields a communicative ecosystem loosening ties with truthfulness and challenging a common ground that science has epistemic authority. In our paper we argue that the declining role of truth as a compass in public discourse and decision-making notable in what were seen as stable democracies poses challenges for the way we do science communication and how we do it on a very fundamental level. We suggest there is a need to reconsider assumptions about “good science communication”, and we suggest that science communication should not ignore the fact that both knowledge and communication are inescapably intertwined with power. Specifically, the power play here is about epistemic authority, sometimes even aspired dominance: who gets to have a say over what is considered knowledge? Importantly, this power play is not, in the current environment, being played collaboratively; it is competitive. “How to communicate science” is not the main issue for communicators anymore, but how to create a communicative environment where people listen at all and might consider a scientifically based argument without, from the onset, dismissing it as “woke”, or “unfree”. In this paper, we argue that science communicators should factor in the strategic interactions that inherently exist in the communicative ecosystem. As a framework to help communicators to analyze these interactions and develop decision-making options, we draw on game theory, a branch of rational choice theory that studies strategic interactions where outcomes depend on the choices of all actors involved. Following this logic, we argue that science communication as a field and set of practices could be empowered by using game theory, and we spell out what this might mean.

Volume 25 • Issue 1 • 2026

Mar 16, 2026 Commentary

Does science communication have its goals wrong? From persuading science skeptics to promoting scientific empowerment

by Anne Toomey and Kevin C. Elliott

There is widespread concern that the scientific enterprise is under attack, fuelled by misinformation campaigns, anti-intellectual political leaders, and growing public skepticism. In response, many scientists are mobilising to “stand up for science,” hoping to persuade publics of the many public health, technological, and economic benefits brought by scientific discoveries. In this commentary, we argue that such persuasion-based science communication approaches are neither effective nor appropriate because they neglect the role that values play in people's perceptions of and experiences with science. We propose shifting our focus to scientific empowerment, which we define as the ability and agency to inform and influence one's life through skills, knowledge, opportunities, experiences, and resources related to science. We argue that scientific empowerment can provide a practical means of acting upon one's values, foregrounding people's questions and concerns about science, rather than focusing on a battle about whose facts can be believed.

Volume 25 • Issue 1 • 2026

Mar 16, 2026 Commentary

From facts to stage: rethinking science communication as theatrical performance

by Michiel van Oudheusden and Willemine Willems

Facts may have been declared dead, yet many science communicators continue to fight to keep them alive. At the same time, it is increasingly clear that preserving facts alone is not enough. To secure a meaningful place for science in today's world, science communicators must also develop new strategies that go beyond defending facts to fostering trust and engagement. They must fully embrace the `post-post truth' condition, in which the blurring of fact and opinion has become deeply entrenched in public discourse; and where many no longer know – or care — what constitutes truth. This can be achieved by rethinking science communication as performance beyond content delivery. This means creating aesthetic, existential, sensorial, and other experiences that make engagement with science more about relationships and identity, and less about establishing a common ground of truth. We illustrate what this approach looks like through the Theatre Dialogues of Dissent — a Dutch science communication project on the polarisation surrounding climate change.

Volume 25 • Issue 1 • 2026

Mar 11, 2026 Editorial

Integrity under pressure: on generative AI, fabricated references and ethical publishing

by Marina Joubert and Michelle Riedlinger

Generative artificial intelligence (AI) tools are increasingly present in academic writing workflows, and their irresponsible use poses a growing threat to the integrity of scholarly publishing. In this editorial, we highlight the emergence of AI-generated references, or so-called “ghost references”, as a specific concern for JCOM and the wider academic community. We consider how AI tools like large language models can produce convincing yet fictitious citations that might bypass standard peer review. Also, we reaffirm JCOM's policy requiring full disclosure of any generative AI use in preparing manuscripts, remind authors that the responsibility for accuracy and integrity lies with those whose names appear on submissions, and outline our commitment to reject, withdraw, or retract manuscripts found to contain fabricated content at any stage of the publication process. As a journal dedicated to science communication, JCOM maintains a strong focus on the honest and transparent development of knowledge.

Volume 25 • Issue 1 • 2026

Mar 09, 2026 Article

Visible sources and invisible risks: exploring the impact of AI disclosure on perceived credibility of AI-generated content

by Teng Lin and Yiqing Zhang

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.

Volume 25 • Issue 1 • 2026

Mar 02, 2026 Article

Perceptions and values of Spanish women scientists towards digital science communication

by Rosana Villares, Carmen Pérez-Llantada and Oana Maria Carciu

The digitalisation of science communication has been widely promoted within the Open Science movement in Europe to foster the social impact of research, as well as a more participatory culture of science. Using semi-structured interviews, we explore Spanish women scientists' values and perceptions regarding digital science communication. Results highlight the social value of science communication as well as intrinsic motivation as factors to actively engage in disseminating, educating and promoting science digitally. Adopting Open Science principles, participants craft open access multimodal materials (e.g., educational short videos, podcasts), use supporting multimodal resources and digital tools, and engage in social media to reach broad audiences. Finally, we propose some policy recommendations and pedagogical guidelines in terms of digital literacy, digital genres, and science accommodation strategies to promote digital science communication.

Volume 25 • Issue 1 • 2026

Feb 23, 2026 Article

“Everything has changed”: a qualitative study of trends in university communication over the past decade

by Isabel Sörensen, Sophia Charlotte Volk, Silke Fürst, Mike S. Schäfer and Daniel Vogler

Universities are pivotal in contemporary knowledge societies, bridging science and society. Amidst societal transformations, communication has become crucial for higher education institutions (HEIs). Yet, research on university communication is limited, with few studies capturing long-term developments. This qualitative study addresses this gap by examining changes in university communication departments over the past decade in Switzerland. Semi-structured interviews with 30 communication practitioners and university leaders in eight HEIs reveal that university communication has diversified with regard to digital channels and stakeholders, intensified in terms of personnel and output, and professionalized. Moreover, some, albeit not all communication departments have increasingly aligned their communication strategies with university strategies. Despite the fact that “everything has changed”, differences exist among various types and clusters of universities. This study contributes to understanding how and why long-term changes in institutional science communication emerge. It also offers insights for communication practitioners for enhancing university communication processes and structures.

Volume 25 • Issue 1 • 2026

Feb 16, 2026 Practice Insight

It's (not) rocket science to think with gender: supporting students to develop confidence in talking about gender through outer space outreach activities

by Eleanor S Armstrong, Doris Erhard, Manuela Gallistl, Sarah Rosenbicher and Christian Klösch

“What might our lives in outer space look like in the future? And how will those lives be shaped by gender?” These were the questions that directed students in a science communication activity in the Vienna Museum of Science and Technology in 2024. This Practice Insight reflects on this project and demonstrates how an expansive focus on gender in the long-term engagement project allowed student participants to challenge and pluralize normative masculinities of outer space futures, instead envisaging cosmic lives that supported traditional women's crafts, or gender-inclusive third spaces and city design. Rather than framing “women” and “girls” as the only subject for gender-oriented activities, this project encouraged students and educators to recognize that gender is done many different ways by different groups in societies. The paper provides prompts to readers to support them implementing similar transformations in their own science communication practices.

Volume 25 • Issue 1 • 2026

Feb 11, 2026 Editorial

Editorial | Science Communication pursing the “unexpected places”

by Fabio Ribeiro, Sónia Silva and Thaiane Oliveira

Space is also communication. Widely regarded as an urban and daily space philosopher, Henri Lefebvre (1974) argued that space, as a physical dimension, is a shared platform to induce ower and lifestyle options, through a general social agreement. As such, Lefebreve proposed three perspectives: 1) conceived space (planned, technical, institutional); 2) perceived space (deeply rooted in daily practices); 3) living spaces (associated with symbolic and sentimental experiences). Years later, Michel de Certeau’s (1980) proposition of space as a “stable order”, “planned” and practice-oriented was then also studied by Marc Augé (1992), suggesting the concept of “non-places”, defined as the total absence of identity, relationships and historical meaning. Airports, shopping centres, hotels, walking circuits, just to name a few, were the symbol of such a lack of interaction, guided by visual and informative signs. Circulation, income and consumption are the key figures of these “non-spaces”.

Volume 25 • Issue 2 • 2026 • Science communication in Unexpected Places (Unexpected places)