New Paradigm for Science Communication
The Culture Wars Teach Us a Lesson
SOURCE: hungry i via flickr
The nature of the media has changed since the 1950s and 1960s.
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We’ll be hearing it a lot today: 50 years ago, the Soviets launched Sputnik. In the ensuing melee, the U.S. government established an exceedingly strong relationship with the nation’s scientific community and relied upon its expertise to find a way to increase our national scientific and technological competitiveness. Science-in-policymaking reached a zenith—and then started a precipitous decline.
The culture wars exploded. Our national politics became more polarized and contentious. Science fights erupted regularly around environmental, regulatory, and moral issues. In some cases science advisers were even fired.
We’ve gone from the age of Edward R. Murrow to the age of Bill O’ReillyAnd then came the Bush administration, demonstrating just how large the gap between a president and the nation’s knowledge base can really get. Today we look around anguished and feel sorely tempted to label the 1950s and early 1960s a golden age of scientific inquiry married to effective government policymaking.
Yet it would be a serious mistake to blame political polarization alone for a declining influence of the scientific community on U.S. policy. It is certainly true that science suffered along with many other forms of serious expertise over the past several decades, beaten down by our divisive politics. But let’s not forget that something else has vastly changed since the 1950s and 1960s as well: the nature of the media.
We’ve gone from the age of Edward R. Murrow to the age of Bill O’Reilly. And if we seek the reasons that scientists have seen their influence on policy decline—and the gulf between themselves and society widen—we can’t neglect that there’s been very little adaptation on the part of the scientific community to a radically different, and far more challenging, media environment.
Two decades ago we truly had “papers of record.” And if you sat down to watch the evening news at 6 p.m., you pretty much had to opt for network news coverage, including coverage of science-related issues that were seriously explored. Today, in contrast, newspapers are struggling, but we have millions of blogs, ideologically driven news outlets matching every political persuasion, hundreds of cable channels, and Google News to sift our headlines.
The consequence is profound: Citizens who don’t care about science now don’t have to hear about it at all. They don’t need to stick their fingers in their ears and go, “la la la.” They can simply steer away from that particular channel, or from that particular nook of the Internet. They can just watch the Food Network.
As a result, scientists can no longer assume that a responsible and high-minded media will treat their ideas with the decorum and seriousness they deserve and deliver them up to policymakers and the public for somber consideration. Instead, partisan media will convey diametrically opposed versions of where science actually stands on any contentious subject—even as most of the public (and many policymakers) tune out science more or less completely in favor of entertainment, sports, and other media choices.
It’s a perfect recipe for the declining influence of science amid political polarization, misinformation, and unedifying discourse at media outlets—many of which take a generally antagonistic approach to the scientific community, depicting it as a convocation of liberal eggheads. So should scientists and their defenders simply wring their hands and complain about this dismal state of affairs? Or should they instead take steps to adapt to the modern media environment to ensure their continuing relevance and influence?
Fortunately, a new dialogue and perhaps even a new paradigm are now emerging about how to communicate science, through the media, to policymakers, and the broader public. It’s epitomized by The Scientist magazine’s October cover story, in which two communication scholars, Matthew Nisbet of American University and Dietram Scheufele of the University of Wisconsin, explain why scientists must strategically “frame” their knowledge to make it relevant to the diverse audiences that draw information from our fragmented media system.
Nisbet and Scheufele explain in detail what the modern media really means for the transmission of scientific information, and how scientists must adjust accordingly. The gist of their argument is directed straight at scientific institutions, which they say must pare down scientific information and emphasize those aspects of an issue that will resonate with the values and dispositions of diverse audiences.
The two scholars built upon some initial ideas about “framing science” that Nisbet and I first suggested in an April article in Science magazine (subscription required except for members of the American Association for the Advancement of Science), but they carry the argument much further by outlining a comprehensive communications strategy for scientists. This isn’t “spin,” it’s good communication. It increases receptivity to a scientific message.
An accompanying editorial titled “Scientists on Science,” by The Scientist editor Richard Gallagher, acknowledges as much and whole-heartedly endorses the approach, conceding that scientists simply cannot remain passive in the transmission of knowledge. They’ve got to be heavily involved, from beginning to end.
The truth is facts don’t ever speak for themselves. Especially in today’s media environment, they need a messenger, a skilled one. Furthermore, if you don’t frame your knowledge and make it relevant in today’s communication environment, you must get ready to be ignored—or, worse, to have someone else frame your scientific research for you, perhaps in the most unflattering of ways.
Fifty years after Sputnik, then, there’s much that we must do to re-establish a strong influence of scientists on policy. Indeed, we need our scientists now more than ever to ready us for the myriad problems facing humanity. But there are some areas in which science can also help itself. Communication is one of them. That’s why scientists and scientific institutions would be well advised today to consider the advice offered by Nisbet and Scheufele. Scientists have already proven they know how to research, how to think. Now is the time for learning how to speak to all Americans.
Chris Mooney is the Washington correspondent for Seed magazine and author of two books, The Republican War on Science and Storm World: Hurricanes, Politics, and the Battle Over Global Warming. He blogs on The Intersection with Sheril Kirshenbaum.
Comments on this article
” facts don’t ever speak for themselves. Especially in today’s media environment, they need a messenger, a skilled one.”
Sounds like something whispered into the ear of a seventh century Arabian merchant , or worse, an invitation to elevate the underlying problem to the status of a solution
October 5th, 2007 at 11:13 am“We’ve gone from the age of Edward R. Murrow to the age of Bill O’Reilly.”
The technical phrase for that is “gross oversimplification.” Yes, the fifties and early sixties had Murrow and a couple of other genuine delights on tv. But the amount of sheer garbage was absolutely stupefying. I know. I saw it.
For some insight into how bad tv really was – it’s not any better today or much worse, imo – pick up the uncut Beatles on Ed Sullivan and watch them all from beginning to end, if you dare.
You’ll never characterize “the Golden Age of Television” as the “age of Murrow” again.
Regarding effective science communication, you bet. All for it. Love Mythbusters and a lot of the science shows.
The devil’s in the details. Most science is hard for us laypeople to understand and much can’t be finessed, I gather, without distorting it. And it makes no sense to hide from the religious right or the anti-global warming crowd; they take such action as signs of weakness and, like The Blob with a monkey on its back, demand more, more, more.
Better an all-out confrontation, get it out in the open. It expands the range of acceptable discourse. Otherwise, you will end up being pummelled further and further to the right and further and further into making concessions not to the religious but to religious nuts.
October 6th, 2007 at 11:34 amGregory,
“We need to increase critical thinking, not less [sic].”
As much as an increase in critical thinking will be absolutely necessary for our survival in the increasingly hostile economic and environmental conditions we will soon find ourselves in, a statement like the above speaks exactly to the flaw in current scientific communications strategies that Mooney speaks of.
In order for the scientific community to regain the stature it once had in American political discourse, it will be necessary — as it has always been, to some extent — to simplify findings and their implications in order for the average American to understand them and put pressure on politicians to take action. You cannot talk down to someone and expect them to take you seriously. Right now, there is no dialogue because of this.
We cannot expect people to begin to take science seriously until the scientific community makes a concerted effort to reach people where they are, on their level. Then, and only then, can we begin to expect critical thinking to increase.
October 6th, 2007 at 3:58 pmChris Mooney is too glib. Yes, scientists deserve some of the blame for Americans’ minimal understanding of Science today, but most of the blame goes to the media and our schools.
When I took courses in physics or chemistry, there were certain pre-requisites- background skills needed to understand the material. Most American students are math-phobic and didn’t want to take advanced math, so our universities dumbed down the science curricula, giving math free chemistry and physics course, which consisted of memorizing facts. No wonder that the US government doesn’t want our students to take the international advanced math and sciences testing (TIMSS-A). It’s disgraceful that we don’t want people to know how badly our teach to the test approach prepares students for real math and science.
Consider this example of the ridiculous media “look what those scientists say today” approach, from the Washington Post, which pretends to be one of our better newspapers. This is Seth Borenstein’s recent: Scientists: Appendix protects good germs”. First of all, this is NOT a study, as seen by its appearance in the Journal of Theoretical Biology. It is a theoretical proposal. Readers need some background or prerequisite: that very few mammals have a vermiform appendix- dogs and pigs, whose diet may resemble ours, do not. We start with the assumption that the Appendix probably has a useful function and is found in rabbits, higher apes, man and marsupials- so what do chimps, gorillas and humans share that makes the appendix useful to them and not to dogs, pigs and fish? Is there a risk that we share or a protective function that other species have and we lack. Intestinal infection and parasites are a problem for all animals. We know from studies like those cited by the Bollinger paper that bacterial numbers are much greater in the cecum and proximal colon than in the distal colon (also in rodents who have no appendix) and that those bacteria are often found in crypts. The finding that the appendix has more bacteria and more biofilm fits right in but doesn’t answer the question why do so few mammals have appendices? Maybe those of us with appendices have fewer crypts or cecal crypts of different type. Humans without spleens have real problems in certain circumstances- that’s why patients with sickle cell anemia stay on antibiotics. If the appendix is a useful reservoir of commensals, maybe humans lacking appendices recover more slowly from diarrhea and other disturbances when they get broad spectrum antibiotics (as in patients on chemotherapy with suspected ‘sepsis”) – until some evidence for this emerges, there’s no reason for newspapers to carry this stuff. Most offensive of all is the way that the author finishes by referring us to some “talking heads” just as we get when we hear about Iraq, foreign policy, global warming- no background so that we can possibly understand the story and no reference to web sites that review the background material, just an appeal to authorities- giving us two opposing authorities is no answer.
Why does the Post do this? Why didn’t Mr. Borenstein take some time, read the paper and lay out some background? Clearly they are not trying to educate anyone. Whether it is to distract us from bad news, to titillate or just as filler, I don’t know but I don’t appreciate it.
October 7th, 2007 at 7:09 pmcut the BS and solve global warming!!!
October 10th, 2007 at 10:23 pm