Framing Science

Tonight I board a plane for Venice, Italy where I will be presenting as part of an expert workshop on science communication, sponsored by the EU, Istituto Veneto di Scienze, observa Science in Society, and the University of Trent. Some of the top European researchers in the field will be at the workshop, so I hope to be able to report on innovative ideas and themes from the two day event. And for those that read Italian, I have an op-ed appearing in tomorrow's edition of La Stampa, focusing on new directions in science communication. More on that to come.

Economic troubles and what to do about them are not unlike climate change or biomedical research. Both economic policy and science policy can be deeply complex and uncertain and can easily be interpreted through the lens of ideology and partisanship. As a result, communicating about these issues should not be a guessing game, relying solely on intuition or experience to guide message design and the targeting of audiences. Instead they should be based on careful audience research. From Bloomberg News: President-elect Barack Obama's top political aides are transplanting their campaign tactics…

Turns out that GOP message guru Frank Luntz doesn't think much of the Bush administration's communication strategy across the past eight years. In an interview with NPR's On the Media (audio above, transcript), here's part of what he had to say about the Bush lexicon: FRANK LUNTZ: I don't think all that much of George Bush's linguistic mastery will live beyond him. The problem with Bush is that he talked about privatizing Social Security before he talked about personalizing it, so that undermined that way of articulating. He talked about a bailout rather than calling it a recovery plan or a…

Now that Obama has his science and environmental policy team in place, there's great optimism for important new directions in policy. Yet it will take smart and effective communication to meaningfully engage Americans on these policies, especially in the context of an overwhelming public focus on the economy. Consider that in a WPost/ABC News poll released today, when asked in an open-ended question to name the most important problem the President and Congress should focus on, 55% named the economy, 1% named gas prices/energy, and less than 1% named greenhouse gases/global warming. When asked…

President-elect Obama's remarks at a press conference today should sound familiar to readers of this blog: "A couple of years ago I was invited to Rick Warren's church to speak despite his awareness that I held views that were entirely contrary to his when it came to gay and lesbian rights, when it came to issues like abortion," he said. "Nevertheless I had an opportunity to speak, and that dialogue I think is part of what my campaign's been all about, that we're not going to agree on every single issue, but what we have to do is to be able to create an atmosphere where we can disagree…

In a Policy Forum article this week at Science, Hampshire College professor Salman Hameed discusses the reasons for widespread rejection of evolution across Islamic countries. Surveys show, for example, that public acceptance of evolution stands at lower than 20% in many Muslim nations. The reason, Hameed details, is that few citizens have had exposure to evolution in school and so to form an opinion about evolution, instead rely on what they might pick up via interpersonal sources or in the media. The result is that many Muslims misperceive evolution as equaling atheism and as a direct…

Over at George Mason's Center for Climate Change Communication, they are hosting a poll asking readers to vote for the 2008 Climate Change Communicator of the Year. Among the choices are such notables as Thomas Friedman, Bill McKibbon, John Warner, and Chevron's "Will You Join Us" Campaign. But my vote would be for a name not on that list: the Reverend Richard Cizik, VP for Governmental Affairs of the National Association of Evangelicals. Cizik is a perfect spokesperson for a hard to mobilize segment of Republican-leaning America. Not only does he have credibility among Evangelicals, but…

About a 100 attendees turned out for Thursday night's talk at the New York Academy of Sciences. The event marked the end of a year long series on science communication that was launched by Kate Seip, Liz Oswald, and other New York-area graduate students in partnership with the Academies. As I mentioned at the outset of my talk, the series offers a unique model to be reproduced in major cities with well developed institutional science hubs such as San Francisco and Chicago. Already, a similar prototype exists in Seattle through the work of students at FOSEP and the University of Washington…

Even after Sam-I-Am persuades me to try them? On the other hand, can we learn something from this book about selling science? Evolution? Are our anti-Creationist tactics, for instance, better or worse than Sam's? Or is his strategy inappropriate for this topic?

The NY Academy of Sciences offers a stunning venue for public talks, forums, and receptions, with a view from the 40th floor of 7 World Trade Center. Thursday morning I will be heading up to New York to give a 7pm talk at the New York Academy of Sciences. A crowd of more than 100 is expected for what I am hoping to be an interesting discussion and entertaining reception to follow. (Register for free here.) Here's a brief preview of what I will be talking about followed by more specific details: Over the past few years there have been signs of a major shift in how the scientific community in…

A few bloggers have registered their reaction to last week's PRI radio segment that questions the wisdom of calling climate change and evolution opponents "deniers." Most notably Orac, Mike the Mad Biologist, and Mark Hofnagle argue that their preferred brand of name calling remains the best communication strategy. But Orac, Mad Mike, and Mark overlook that the key audience in these rhetorical fisticuffs is not the small group of so-called "denialists" but rather the wider spectator public who may otherwise be ambivalent about a complex, seemingly remote issue such as climate change. As I…

PRI The World ran a 10 minute feature today on the wisdom of using the term "denier" in the debate over climate change and other science policy controversies. Correspondent Jason Margolis does a terrific job in synthesizing research and comments from various experts on why the use of the label by science advocates is likely to be a major blunder. My comments come at about 7 minutes and 15 seconds into the archived audio. What do readers think? Convinced yet that "denier" should be dropped from our lexicon?

My heads up on a forthcoming segment at Public Radio International's The World has generated a discussion about the communication misfires that science advocates create when they use terms such as "denier" and "anti-science." The segment is scheduled to appear tomorrow (Friday). It will follow a report on climate change that appears about 32 minutes into the program. PRI The World is heard on 218 stations across the country, check here for local stations and times. Archived audio of the segment will appear here as of 5pm EST tomorrow.

For members of the science policy community, I will be giving a talk tonight at 6pm at AAAS headquarters, titled "Science Communication Reconsidered: Key Issues for 2009 and Beyond." (1200 New York Ave., NW.) In the talk, I will be focusing in detail on recent innovations in public engagement efforts as well as the prospects for a new generation of science policy experts. It should prove to be an interesting forum and debate over what's ahead and the possible directions to take as scientists and their institutions hope to better engage Americans on issues such as climate change,…

Photo credit. Readers in DC, New York City, and several other locations may be interested in turning out for talks I will be giving over the coming months. Details on dates, sponsors, and locations are below (the last still pending). Science Communication Re-Considered: Key Issues for 2009 and Beyond Monday, Nov. 17, 6pm AAAS Headquarters 1200 New York Ave., NW *For DC science policy community, RSVP here. Communicating Science in a Changing World Thurs, Dec. 4, 7pm New York Academy of Sciences Free to the public Science Communication at a Crossroads Thurs. Feb. 5, 2009 Science, Technology,…

Were Ronald Reagan and Carl Sagan the dominant communicators of the 1980s? Watching this past week the PBS American Experience biopic on Reagan reinforced in my mind the parallels between the president and the astronomer that I have mentioned at this blog before and during Q&A at talks. The Great Communicator and the Showman for Science coined the dominant metaphors of the 1980s, Reagan referring to the Soviet Union as the "Evil Empire" and Sagan re-casting the strategic arms race in terms of "nuclear winter." In the years before cable television fragmented Americans into ever smaller…

Viral video marketing of science instruments seems to be flurishing: Monty Python and the Holy Instrument:

The September 2007 issue of JCOM - Journal of Science Communication - (issue 3, volume 7) is online.: Next issue will be online on the 18th December 2008. There are several articles in this issue that I find interesting and bloggable. Contents: EDITORIAL - The better you know, the better you make your choice. The need for a scientific citizenship in the era of knowledge by Pietro Greco: Martin W. Bauer is right, two evolutionary processes are under way. These are quite significant and, in some way, they converge into public science communication: a deep evolution of discourse is unfolding,…

Back in July, I sat down for an hour long interview with the new TED-like social media site Big Think. The innovative project features "hundreds of hours of direct, unfiltered interviews with today's leading thinkers" segmented by topic category and spliced into 3 to 4 minute conversations. The general focus of the interview was on the nature of strategic communication with an emphasis on science and environmental topics. Big Think has organized the conversations into 11 different sections. I link to several of these below with the description from the site. The themes will be familiar to…

On Thursday, Dec. 4, I will be speaking at the New York Academy of Sciences, located on the 40th floor of World Trade Center #7. It's a busy academic year, with several upcoming speaking engagements. Below are the dates and venues that are scheduled. I hope to see and meet blog readers at these events! 02.10.09 American Museum of Natural History Panel on communicating about climate change. 12.04.08 New York Academy of Sciences Lecture on "Communicating Science in a Changing World" 11.17.08 AAAS Fellows, Washington DC. Invite only presentation to current and former scientist policy fellows.…