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Summary Science and Communication
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Summary of all lectures given in the course of science and communication, including images.
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HC’s Science CommunicationHC 1: introduction (05/08/23)
-Wat is science communication? -> accessibility (make it accessible for ‘normal’ people)
• Involves informing, educating, sharing wonderment/happiness, and raising awereness of science-
related topics.
• Can occur in many forms and can have several functions:
o Science popularization -> People need to understand both cognitional and emotional.
o Public understanding of science
o Public engagement with science
o Intra-scientific but inter-disciplinary communication
o Transdisciplinary communication: knowledge co-production
▪ Try to work with patients/workers/professionals
-Science communication as a discipline
• A specific term only since 1990
• Before that:
o Science journalism
o Popularizing science
o Science education
• Field is in its teenage years at best.
o Not many students, not many scholars have a phd in Science Communication.
o Most of the tenured faculty has a background in another field.
o Diversity in understanding what the field entails and how it relates to other fields.
-Science communication as a practice
• Examples:
o Communication departments of universities and academic hospitals
o Science centers & museums
o Science shows on TV & radio
o Science in newspapers & magazines
o Debates & dialogue
o Zoological gardens
o But also....
▪ RIVM
▪ Governmental press conferences during the COVID19 pandemic
-Definitions:
• Science communication
• Science
• Communication
-Science, communication, and the public
• Main units of analysis:
, o Public: public at large, elderly, school pupils, museum visitors, etc
o Science: STEM, social science and humanities, research
o Mediators: communicators, journalists, curators, publicists, facilitators
-Science communication = boundary work (needs to be done by mediators) -> You have to define
differences between different social works to communicate in a good way and to understand.
• You have to minimize the gap, but it is also important to acknowledge that there are different social
worlds and sometimes it is helpful to mention these boundaries.
• Science communicators exist at the interface of different social worlds: scientific world & world of
public sphere & world of policy.
• Science communicators (organizations) can be seen as boundary organizations.
• It exists in the middle and helps to stabilize and nurture the boundary or interface.
• In order to better understand the response of science communication organizations to the
(suggested post-truth) society, in-depth analysis on various organizations is required to understand
how and why these organizations shape the interface between science and society in the way they
do.
• Science communication reflective placement internship!
-Why is science communication important?
• Why is it important for the public to hear about science?
• Why is it important for the public to understand science?
• Why is it important for science to be communicated to the public?
• Why is it important to involve the public in science?
-Science communication paradox -> The more and more knowledge, the more it becomes difficult to
understand each other/communicate (because you can have more different ideas/ideologies if there is
more knowledge).
• What do we need?
o A language that is both compelling and understandable
o A platform where scientific information can be shared.
o Intermediaries that do the translation work
• Extra layer of the paradox -> It is not only becoming complicated, but there are also arising more
complex problems.
o Complex/wicked problem, constructed of:
▪ Caused by technological development (science)
• So, science and technology -> Cause & solution
▪ We want to now tackle it with science again!
▪ A lot of people have very diverse ideas -> Normative diversity
▪ Scientific uncertainty
o Why are complex problems wicked:
▪ No linear problem-solution relation. Solutions create new problems.
• A lot of technical solutions cause new social problems (corona vaccine)
▪ Problem definitions are changing/fluid -> Depend heavily on how they are framed.
• ‘Who’s’ problem is it? And through which frame do we see the problem?
What are priorities?
▪ Risk of democratic deficit -> They appear as technical problems and are discussed as
such, but there are many political and normative issues at stake.
-Science communication is actually HOW to communicate in order to understand! -> How we (should)
communicate about science is now more important than ever.
HC 2: what is communication? 06/08/23
-Science & communication:
• What is science communication?
• What is science?
, o Where & how is it done?
• What is communication?
o Where and how is it done?
-Purpose of this lecture:
• Understand communication as a human interaction.
• Discover the challenges of human communication.
• Develop insight into the complexities involved in communicating science.
Communication as human interaction
-What is communication -> Can we conceptualize it?
-There is a sender in communication and a receiver.
• The sender says something to have a specific effect.
o Example: Rutte wanted people to wear a face mask
o Assumptions in this example:
▪ That the receiver understands what the sender says.
▪ The ability of understanding.
• The common sense view of communication! Has several central assumptions (in mass media):
o Mass media reaches everyone
o 1-way flow of information
o Direction relation between message and effect
o Receiver is able and willing to process information
o Receiver is passive and uncritical
− This is a linear model
▪ Can have different versions
• So, the sender has a certain effect in mind.
-Linear models:
• Very old model -> Lasswell’s model of communication (1948) -> Who says what to whom through
what channel with what effect?
o BUT: what is problematic about this way of reasoning and the assumptions?
▪ Example: news paper about youth is causing a rise in corona infections.
• So, the RIVM started a campaign after noticing this: “Youth should change
behaviour”
• What is problematic about this?
o The press conferences and all the talk about it and the campaign had
so many effects that it can hardly been captured in 1 model.
o It did not work because:
, ▪ Expectations
▪ Elderly doing whatever they want.
• Shannon-Weaver model (1949) → able to make the noise visible (the noise that happened in the
previous example about corona).
o Based on that you need a receiver for the message to get on the destination.
o So, another news paper, things are changing!: “Youth and corona: let parents motivate and
correct” and “Youth demands a say in corona measures government”.
▪ Already going into the context of the receiver but also the sender! (what the sender
wanted, did not work during previous newspaper)
▪ “What do we need to do to reach our destination?”
• Berelson (1949) -> Some kinds of communication on some kinds of issues, brought to the attention
of some kinds of people under some kinds of conditions, have some kinds of effects.
o Has more nuance; importance of context
o If you want young people to change behaviour, then you need to refine the issues and how
to address them and think about what kind of communications you use.
• Berlo’s model of communication (1960) -> Makes it a little more complicated even.
o The receiver needs to decode the codes that the sender have send. And you need certain
contacts or skills or knowledge to be able to decode what the sender is sending!
-So, all these linear models have a sender and a receiver, but this steps in between differ.
-All the elements that are important in reality are in the model (visible). What has been taken out of the
model (reduction)?
• These linear models use a passive receiver → makes the activity that the receiver takes invisible!
o Example: Noise is made visible by Shannon-weaver model!
-These models also do nothing say about how the sender tries to let the people understand its message.
-Why linear models don’t work:
• Mass media do not reach everyone
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