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Communication Challenges and Opps

Communication Subgroup Discussion

Challenges

1. Communicating controversial topics to non-scientists

  • Solution aversion – it’s not that they don’t trust scientists, when it comes to climate change and it affects the individual (carbon footprint) then we should “re-evaluate the science” 
  • Reword: People are more willing to challenge the science with politically charged issues (climate change, GMO) than when it comes to scientific topics that are less affecting everyday life
  • Varies from country to country – Australia; the value of science in different political climates. Politicians = election cycles and governmental support for science; science = funded

2. Making ecology transparent and accessible 

  • Management (USFS) and politicians need answers quicker than academics can provide.
  • Communicating the methods
  • Communicating broad ecological theories
  • Effectively communicating to the right people
  • Communicating the relevance of an issue (framing, messaging)

3. People aren’t interested in the natural world (highly urbanized environment) – they don’t see the benefit in protect it

  • Conservation versus Preservation.
  • How do we promote engagement and appreciation without promoting overuse and degradation of wild species?
  • Get people involved through citizen science- outlet for people who are already interested. 
     

4. Technology

  • Social media – people don’t check the facts before the start spreading information
  • Can be exclusionary because not everyone has access to computers/phones/internet/etc.

5. Local Ecology – public desire for community-driven science for local action

  • Problems faced by human communities are often too specific for generalized ecological research conducted at academic institutions
  • The more knowledge we attain about how ecosystems function, and the more nuanced our solutions are to problems, the more necessary it will be to make our work relatable to the common public and to common problems.

Opportunities

1.    Communicating Ecological Science to Scientists and the Public: Effective use of Technology

  • Social media
  • Data collection
  • Peer to peer networks and workshops (online)
  • Free information and new methods online/ open access
  • Connect countries
  • Live lab notebooks – communicate your science through blog
  • The Conversation

2.    Communicating Ecological Science to the Public: Science as community service

  • Small projects for schools/K-12, 4H, prison programs (Nalini Nadkarni with lichen program, also butterfly prison program)
    • Connect science with community service – you are doing your community a service by participating in scientific research (ie. conservation – pollinator friendly plants)

3.    Communicating Ecological Science to Stakeholders: Bring right stakeholders to the table for each issue of concern

  • People are concerned about climate change, decline of pollinators, species extinction 
  • Mobilize already engaged/interested people through citizen science and activists (STS, ES) 
    • (Irwin, A. (1995). Citizen science: a study of people, expertise and sustainable development. London, U.K.: Routledge.) 
    • (Del Savio, L., Prainsack, B. and Buyx, A. (2016). ‘Crowdsourcing the Human Gut. Is crowdsourcing also ‘citizen science’?’. JCOM 15 (03), A03) 
    • (Citsci.org; collaborativescience.org; scistarter.com)
  • Translate information into many languages to reach those groups/stakeholders

4.    Communicating Ecological Science to Stakeholders: Assist land managers in decision making

  • Partner with agencies that benefit from research
    • Cooperative extension

5.    Communicating Ecological Science to Stakeholders: Science-art collaboration, landscape architecture is a good example of science-art collaboration. Ideally landscape architects take ecological principles into account in creating an aesthetically pleasing landscape. This would lend itself to collaboration with other fields (another subgroup).

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