This week, members of the National Association of Science Writers mailing list have been discussing the reduction in science overage in major newspapers.
Just this week, the Washington Post’s Monday science “page” was reduced to a 1/2-page feature article, plus a 1/2-page ad. This science feature article will appear only every second week. In the alternate weeks, the science “page” will host the “Department of Human Behavior” column.
Matt Clark, who retired in 1989 as medicine editor of Newsweek, where he had worked for 27 years had this to say:
“When I became a science writer in the 1950s, a major objective of NASW was to advance science as a worthy objective for journalistic coverage, along with politics, sports, and the rest. Eventually, papers began to take science reporting more seriously and some of them instituted science pages and sections, and meanwhile, NASW’s membership grew and grew. I should add that a lot of this new journalistic interest in science had to do with the Cold War, Sputnik and the National Security State that tangentially fostered interest in space exploration.
Some of this growth in science coverage was attributed to polls showing that readers hungered for news about science. But I don’t think this was always true. If you ask the man on the street if he thinks science is an important subject for news coverage, he isn’t going to say No. But he or she really doesn’t think it’s important unless you can address the kind of issue he or she might be facing at the moment—the right kind of running shoes, the best herbal remedies for whatever, the latest cancer cluster but not much else that would justify a papers devoting a whole section to science. The only thing that saved the NY Times Science Tuesday was the advent of PC advertising, I’m told. And when that source dried up, pharmaceutical ads magically came along and the Times merged it’s Thursday health pages with the Tuesday science section. The only reason Jim Gleick’s book “Chaos” was a bestseller, according to a science-writing friend as cynical as I am, is that people thought it was about Wall Street. (That would be doubly true today.)
And contributing to all this, is the shrinking news hole and news staff to fill it at paper after paper, as many of you have noted.
But frankly, I have been convinced for some time that people don’t fundamentally give a damn about the real sciences of physics and mathematics, unless you can show some spectacular space pictures. They’re into fitness without effort, herbs that heal and astrological prophecy just as they were a half-century ago."
I see this as a call for scientists to get active and start communicating, which of course is one of the reasons we blog.
John Gever, currently a Staff writer for the medical news website MedPage Today; formerly freelance science and non-science journalist, wrote:
“This is where blogs and other web formats may do a better job [than conventional science writing], at least in terms of attracting an audience. Their ability to specialize and follow subjects on a daily basis makes it possible for them to develop storylines. And with loyal audiences come advertising opportunities and a business model for blogging as a job rather than a hobby or marketing sideline.”
Lest you bloggers begin to feel overly satisified with your efforts, James Hathaway, Research Communications Manager at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, further points out that:
“Blogs are great, but they only reach narrow, special target audiences. Our real challenge is to reach the broader audiences and tell them the news they don’t already know, which is why the death of science reporting and science sections at newspapers (and, for that matter, the death of newspapers in general) is so upsetting.
I’ve been feeling for some time that we really need to be thinking more about marketing science in the public square (in the broader media venues) if we don’t want scientific research to vanish from in public awareness — and if still want to “cling” to our illusory belief that we can create a more scientifically literate public. Of course, the mere mention of the word “marketing” is likely to cause a great disturbance in the force on this list…
What I’m thinking about when I’m talking about “marketing” is that science writers should go beyond simply writing science news, but should be actively involved in trying to market the news once they have reported it, the way, for example, some of us market books (or, more accurately, the way publishers market books), appearing on talk shows, sending copies to prominent columnists and commentators to try to get the subject widely discussed. Other than by people like Sagan, Gould, and perhaps people like Chris Mooney, this kind of science proselytizing really hasn’t been done much. Public information officers (like myself) do this kind of work on behalf of the universities and labs we represent, but if we are going to get more science out to a broader public, everyone who has a stake in public science communication needs to be involved. The information marketplace is very competitive, and, like all markets, this one can crash."
So the question for you is how can we market science better on the public square? Clearly the public does cares about global warming (if somewhat belatedly), as well as numerous other issues such as feeding the world, finding cures for diseases and enivronmental degradation- all issues intimately associated with scientific research.
Great post Pamela.
I think I’m going to print it off (gosh how pre-Web!) and keep it.
Thanks Richard. It was a very interesting and important discussion I think.
In my own life, I am trying to make more time for this type of communication.
This is funny because I just posted a blog post last week about this!
Very similar to what is happening with book-review supplements, sections or coverage. All being cut or severely reduced in the US newspapers.
Michael, Thanks for the post (which I had missed). " a forum in the mass media to discuss real science in front of millions" would be a dream. I think we need more cross training- journalists with scientific research backgrounds and scientists with degrees in creative writing. And then of course people like Oprah to promote the science. Lets start a movement to lobby Oprah to place a non-fiction science book on her list every few months. I have never watched Oprah but I will if she starts talking about science (that should entice her, dont you think?)
Oh God.
I took a walk in Central Park when I was in the US for a conference. Met two professional-looking ladies, overheard them as they passed…
“What would Oprah say?”
Really.
I think lobbying Oprah to include a nonfiction science book in her book club rotation is a stroke of genius. I think you would be hard pressed to find a more effective method of reaching the general public and convincing them that science is worth their time. Is such an effort already underway? It really is a brilliant idea, I am not joking. Oprah’s hold on people may be scary, but it can be used for so much good! And has been in the past, I think. Mind you, I have never seen a single episode of her show, but have read a bit about it.
Thanks for the support on this idea Anna. I have already written to the editor of PLoS Biology to see what he thinks. What would be the most efficient way to propose this idea to Oprah? One possibility would be to arrive at some consensus proposal from the leading scientific publishers (Cell, nature science, Plos) and then work with the sciencedebate2008 group to promote it. They were highly effective in getting the candidates to answer questions on science.
Maybe one of the eminent and starry science bloggers who is about to start blogging as a result of our competition might write a specially eloquent post? Does Al Gore blog? He’d probably be keen on the idea, so he might join in the cause.
Yes, a lot of interesting points here, thanks for raising them. Didn’t Nature used to do a weekly science news insert in the Guardian newspaper (UK)? Is that still running?
That would be excellent to see science news inserts from the leading scientific publishers. If several of them got together it would be much cheaper.