Introduction:

Have you ever watched a cool new TV series and have been just itching to discuss it with your friends, only to find out that none of your friends have watched it? So, you pick a close friend and decide to try to explain the show to them. But, you might find it difficult to explain the show to your friend in a compelling way; you want to share all of the details about the show that make it great, but you also don’t want to talk your friend’s ear off and bore them. This dilemma is similar to the dilemma faced by scientists trying to communicate their research to others- scientists are super excited by their research and eager to share it, but it can be hard for scientists to distill their research into a digestible way, without delving too far into the nitty-gritty details. No matter how hard you try, there will always be a few details and nuances about your research that will be “lost in translation” as you try to explain your science to others, just like you’ll never be able to fully explain a TV show to someone who has never seen it. Deciding which details to include and which to drop can be challenging- but after reading this article you will have more insight on how to tailor your approach to communicating your science to different types of audiences, so that your main message remains clear and understandable. In this article I’ll provide some tangible tips on honing your main message, keeping your audiences attention, and bringing people in rather than shutting them out with overly complex scientific jargon and nuance.

Tangible Tips:

• First, understand who your target audience is. Are you communicating your research to your family and friends? To a group of elementary school-aged kids? At a conference with colleagues? All these groups have different scientific knowledge bases and so you’ll need to tailor your approach accordingly. If you’re not sure what the audience is, for example, if you’re meeting with a journalist, it would be useful to ask the person interviewing you what the target audience or audience demographics are before being interviewed.⁴

• Decide what your main message is. What is the “take-away” key message that you hope your audience walks away with? For another group of scientists, your main message might be more complex (ie. using the xyz approach will help us further our understanding of the xyz chemical process) but if you’re presenting to a “lay” audience who may/may not have a scientific background, your main message might be more general (ie. if we change xyz, then our study organisms respond xyz). It is helpful to write out this message, even if you don’t actually include it in your presentation.⁴

• Make an outline. Once you’ve nailed down what your main message is, make an outline of what supporting details are needed so that your audience understands your main message. Some things to consider here are: how much time do you have? Do all these additional bits of information directly relate to and support my main message? Are there any bits that might be too complex for my audience, and are tangential enough to cut-out?³

• Minimize the amount of jargon you use. If you do need to use jargon, make sure to clearly define the jargon at the beginning of your presentation/chat. Metaphors are useful when defining new terms/concepts, and so are diagrams or mnemonic devices. Anything that would help cement the definition of the word into your audience’s memory so that they can follow the rest of your presentation. For less-scientifically trained audiences, if you can eliminate your use of jargon altogether, then that’s even better!²

• Attention is a limited resource- treat it as such. When deciding on how much information to try to get across, almost always, less is more. Us scientists tend to want to share all the aspects of the cool work we do, and so we usually err on the side of too much detail, as opposed to not enough detail. If you can avoid delving into details about your research that aren’t necessary to understanding your main message, then do. It’s always better for someone to walk away with one or two main take-aways from your chat/presentation then for your audience to lose the main message because they got too caught up in trying to wrap their heads around nitty-gritty details about your work³.

• Try to meet audiences where they’re at. Absolutely no one else knows as much about your research project as intimately as you do, and so taking extra time and care to explain underlying concepts in simple terms will definitely be appreciated by your audience. This doesn’t mean that you need to dumb down your research to pre-school levels when explaining science to your parents, but you should remember it is very easy for someone you’re talking to to get discouraged/frustrated because your research seems too complex for them to understand, which could lead to them shutting down and no longer even trying to understand, which is obviously not a desirable outcome. Again, it’s better to explain a few things well than try to explain tons of new concepts in a rushed way³.

• Really emphasize the “why”. Why should someone, particularly someone not in your field, pay attention to all this science that you’re spewing at them? If you make it clear from the get-go that your research has strong implications for understanding the impacts of climate change then they will be more likely to be keen to hear more about your research and stay engaged, as opposed to if you jump straight into describing your specific topic of research, without highlighting the broader implications of your work⁴.

Useful Resources:

1. “5 Levels Video Series,” Wired. [Online]. Available: https://www.wired.com/video/series/5-levels. [Accessed: 20-Apr-2022].

This video series is super cool, it demonstrates how scientists can effectively modify their approach to science communication to 5 different “levels” of audiences.

2. K. Kornei, “Are you confused by scientific jargon? So are scientists,” The New York Times, 09-Apr-2021. [Online]. Available: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/09/science/science-jargon-caves.html?smid=tw-share. [Accessed: 20-Apr-2022].

This article delves more into the use of jargon in science and how it can sometimes hinder the accessibility of our science to wide audiences.

3. S. Arthur, “How to communicate science without 'dumbing it down',” American Association for the Advancement of Science, 29-Aug-2019. [Online]. Available: https://www.aaas.org/programs/center-public-engagement-science-and-technology/reflections/how-communicate-science. [Accessed: 20-Apr-2022].

This article discusses similar topics that have been touched on here, since it focuses on how to describe your science in an accessible yet not overly- “dumbed-down” way.

4. M. Shepherd, “9 tips for communicating science to people who are not scientists,” Forbes, 22-Feb-2017. [Online]. Available: https://www.forbes.com/sites/marshallshepherd/2016/11/22/9-tips-for-communicating-science-to-people-who-are-not-scientists/?sh=6ef240c566ae. [Accessed: 20-Apr-2022].

This Forbes article gives some more tips on effectively communicating your science.

Acknowledgments:

Thanks to The (Un)Scientific Method podcast and SciCATS for hosting this workshop series, with funding from NSERC Science Communications Skills Grant.