National Science Week was this month, and many STEM professionals found ourselves communicating our research to the public.
Our communication can be direct, such as public presentations and school activities, but it can also be indirect, explaining our research to professional science communicators.
These communicators include journalists, science writers, and increasingly, podcast hosts and influencers. These communicators talk to us and communicate our research to the public through their own stories.
We get surprisingly little training in talking to these communicators, given the potential impact of their stories.
Good stories can spread far and attract interest. Bad stories can generate controversy, distrust and leave readers completely missing the point of our research.
It’s a storytelling partnership, but there is a conflict between our research story and the one a science communicator wishes to tell.
In good-faith communication, the conflict arises from scientific rigour and precision, competing demands of emotional impact, social context and plain language.
Before my PhD, I worked as a science writer for several Australian and New Zealand publications and institutions.
This meant I was often interviewing scientists and writing, or talking, about their research to the public.
Having a foot in both worlds, I think it’s useful for scientists to understand the elements a science communicator aims for in a good story.
Knowing some of these elements lets us have a basis of shared understanding.
1. What’s the point?
If a science story can’t answer this question, it has failed at its most basic level. The point doesn’t need to be a real-world application, but it does need to show impact, invoke curiosity, or at least demonstrate why you choose to wake up each morning to do the research.
2. A science story is a story first, then the science
This is the most common source of conflict between communicators and scientists. Working with a communicator means understanding they care more about telling a story than exhaustively explaining the research. They’re more comfortable ignoring parts or generalising if it means they can keep a story structure. You can generally expect communicators to aim for a three-act structure, stakes/conflict, characters, world-building and feeling/emotion. People are more important than institutions to a communicator.
3. The methods aren’t the point
As scientists, we get caught up in the methods. Sometimes these methods can tell a compelling story – especially if they involve fieldwork or high-tech analysis. But if they’re not compelling, they’re usually sacrificed for word count.
4. Maybe your research isn’t the point
Some of the best science stories don’t focus on a single paper or scientist. These stories acknowledge that our research influences, and is influenced by, a huge and complex world beyond our labs. Sometimes the story of your research is more impactful when you allow yourself to become a minor character.
These are just a few of the storytelling elements that a communicator thinks of when they approach you for an interview.
You do not have to follow or even accept these elements when interacting with communicators. But you should at least be aware that they will be thinking along these lines.
If you don’t, you leave yourself vulnerable to somebody telling your story in a way you may not like.
Thomas Crow
PhD Student, The University of Queensland
