Science communication is an increasingly important field of activity, research and policy. It should not be assumed however, that science communication practices provide equitable and empowering opportunities for everyone. Social exclusion, inclusion and equity are key challenges for practitioners, researchers, policy makers and funders involved with science communication. In this commentary I reflect on the limitations of the ‘barriers approach to understanding social inclusion and exclusion from science communication and argue instead that a more complex perspective is needed. I conclude
Social inclusion is an emerging preoccupation in the science communication field. The political value of science communication (e.g. in terms of empowerment) and the necessity to address all audiences has always been considered, but in recent times the participation agenda has enriched the rationale and methodologies of the communication of science: social inclusion is not only an issue of access to knowledge, but also of governance and co-production.
Metaphors and visualizations are important for science communication, though they may have limitations. This paper describes the development and evaluation of a novel interactive visualization, the "Dynamic Evolutionary Map"' (DEM), which communicates biological evolution using a non-standard metaphor. The DEM uses a map metaphor and interactivity to address conceptual limitations of traditional tree-based evolutionary representations. In a pilot evaluation biology novices used the DEM to answer questions about evolution. The results suggest that this visualization communicates some conceptual
In contrast to past consensus, many authors now feel that the passive voice compromises the quality of scientific writing. However, studies involving scientific articles are rare. Using a corpus of 60 scientific research articles from six journals, this study examined the proportion of passives used, and the contexts and forms in which they occurred. The results revealed that about 30% of all clauses were passive clauses. The canonical form was most pervasive, followed by the bare passive; together, they constituted more than a quarter of all clauses analyzed. Passives were typically used in
This paper explores media coverage of climate science through a selection of Spanish newspapers (El País, El Mundo, ABC, Expansión and Levante). We selected a stratified random sample of 363 items to be studied for eleven years (2000-2010). Content analysis allowed us to find out media attention paid to climate science, prevalence of informative tables, evaluation and characterization of news, as well as the presence of questioning or rejection of climate change. According to main results, press coverage of climate science in Spain was mainly focused on the consequences rather than on the
The study investigated the extent to which transmission and cognition, the first two stages in the research use process, are accomplished for winemakers. “Transmission-cognition” was operationalized as the frequency of engagement with information sources considered to be carriers of scientific research. The study also investigated the prominence of four types of research use among winemakers (conceptual, symbolic, instrumental and persuasive) together with their inter-relationship. Conceptual use of scientific information was reported by 90% of winemakers and is a precursor to the other types
As science museums and centres (SMC) broaden their practices to include the development of scientific citizenship, evaluation needs also to take account of this dimension of their practices. It requires complex methods to understand better the impacts of public participation in activities mediated by SMC, including their impacts on the governance of the SMC themselves.
Evaluations of science communication activities before, during and after their implementation can provide findings that are useful in planning further activities. As some selected examples show, designing such evaluation is complex: they may involve assessment at various points, a mix of quantitative and qualitative methods, and show that impacts differ when seen from different perspectives.
The great increase in visitor studies on science museums and centres (SMC) has been marked also by a shift in approach to these studies, paying more attention to the social context of the visits and the nature of the experience. Evaluations have influenced directly SMC exhibition practices but more attention needs to be paid in research about the personal experiences of visits, how these are interpreted and how they contribute to scientific literacy.
An evaluation toolkit developed as part of the EU-funded PLACES project was applied in 26 case studies across Europe. Results show, among other things, the contribution of science communication initiatives to public curiosity, professional networking and perception of cities where these initiatives are stronger.
In the last two years SISSA Medialab designed, tested and evaluated two projects aiming at empowering children (in one case) and teenagers (in the other) to act as science journalists in order to promote a personal, critical attitude towards science and technology. The two groups produced a paper magazine and a blog, respectively, in a participatory process, in which adults acted as facilitators and experts on demand, but the youths were the leaders and owners of the products. Special care was taken to ensure inclusiveness, by involving in the project children and teenagers from any social
Listening to and empowering children is a main objective of the EU project SIS Catalyst – Children as Change Agents for Science in Society. Within this frame, a training workshop was held with researchers from the University Innsbruck (Austria) who are involved in the children’s University Junge Uni Innsbruck. We analysed the discussions of the scientists about the reasons why they engage in science in society activities, and why they think that children are interested in participating in such activities, and we compared these outcomes with similar discussions carried out by children in the