scholarly journals The role of climate scientists in the post-factual society

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erlend M. Knudsen ◽  
Oria J. de Bolsée
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Social Media ◽  
General Public ◽  
Science Communication ◽  
Polar Regions ◽  
Awareness Campaign ◽  
Climate Change Science

Abstract. The politicization of and societal debate on climate change science has increased over the last decades. Here, the authors argue that the role of climate scientists in our societies needs to adapt in accordance with this development. We share our experiences from the awareness campaign Pole to Paris, which engaged the general public on climate change issues on the roads from the polar regions to Paris and through conventional and social media. Based on these experiences, as well as those from other science communication initiatives, we suggest a way forward for climate scientists in the post-factual society.

scholarly journals Communicating climate change in a “post-factual” society: lessons learned from the Pole to Paris campaign

2019 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 83-93
Author(s):  
Erlend M. Knudsen ◽  
Oria J. de Bolsée
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Social Media ◽  
Science Communication ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
Polar Regions ◽  
Awareness Campaign ◽  
Climate Change Science ◽  
Climate Action ◽  
The Impact

Abstract. The politicization of and societal debate on climate change science have increased over the last decades. Here, the authors argue that the role of climate scientists in our society needs to adapt in accordance with this development. We share our experiences from the awareness campaign Pole to Paris, which engaged non-academic audiences on climate change issues on the roads from the polar regions to Paris and through conventional and social media. By running and cycling across a third of the globe, the scientists behind the initiative established connections on the audiences' terms. Propitiously for other outreach efforts, the exertions were not in themselves the most attractive; among our social media followers, the messages of climate change science and action were more favourable, as measured by video statistics and a follower survey. Communicating climate action in itself challenges our positions as scientists, and here we discuss the impact such messages have on our credibility as researchers. Based on these reflections, as well as those from other science communication initiatives, we suggest a way forward for climate scientists in the post-factual society, who should be better trained in interaction with non-academic audiences and pseudoscepticism.

Science communication and mediatised environmental conflict: A cautionary tale

2021 ◽  
pp. 096366252098513
Author(s):  
Claire Konkes ◽  
Kerrie Foxwell-Norton
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Political Communication ◽  
Science Communication ◽  
Climate Science ◽  
Environmental Conflict ◽  
Cautionary Tale ◽  
James Cook ◽  
Social Sphere ◽  
Tenured Position

When Australian physicist, Peter Ridd, lost his tenured position with James Cook University, he was called a ‘whistleblower’, ‘contrarian academic’ and ‘hero of climate science denial’. In this article, we examine the events surrounding his dismissal to better understand the role of science communication in organised climate change scepticism. We discuss the sophistry of his complaint to locate where and through what processes science communication becomes political communication. We argue that the prominence of scientists and scientific knowledge in debates about climate change locates science, as a social sphere or fifth pillar in Hutchins and Lester’s theory of mediatised environmental conflict. In doing so, we provide a model to better understand how science communication can be deployed during politicised debates.

Neutralizing Maleficent Effects of COVID-19 Through Entrepreneurship

2021 ◽  
pp. 67-86
Author(s):  
Manpreet Arora ◽  
Roshan Lal Sharma
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
Social Media ◽  
Special Reference ◽  
General Public ◽  
Business Development ◽  
The World ◽  
Social Media Platforms ◽  
Current Scenario ◽  
Entrepreneurial Activities

Entrepreneurs are regarded as the leaders of socio-economic, industrial, and business development. They are important pillars of any economy. They are the employment generators and contribute to economic growth. In the current scenario caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, we witnessed people across the world losing their jobs. An inclination towards entrepreneurial activities has been observed in 2020. People have started communicating how entrepreneurial activities are the only solution for economies in crises. The role of social media platforms cannot be under-emphasized, and therefore, an entrepreneur today has to be a master of various media of communication. This chapter aims at exploring the concept of entrepreneurship with special reference to communication. It highlights challenges and issues in the post-pandemic world with reference to entrepreneurship and the role effective communication can play in handling them. It also attempts to examine the use of the term ‘entrepreneurship' by general public on social media such as Twitter in particular with a view to work out its implications.

Narrative Persuasion and Storytelling as Climate Communication Strategies

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael D. Jones ◽  
Holly Peterson
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Science Communication ◽  
Scientific Information ◽  
Personal Control ◽  
Human Cognition ◽  
Specific Information ◽  
Policy Narratives ◽  
Climate Change Science ◽  
Narrative Scholarship ◽  
Policy Solutions

Despite scientific consensus about anthropogenic climate change and its potentially devastating effects on the earth, public perceptions remain resistant to some of the most important climate change science messages. Science communicators may help the public better understand, accept, and discuss climate change information by incorporating recent findings in narrative scholarship from the academic field of public policy. Narratives help people understand and communicate information by organizing information in a way that is conducive to human cognition. Through integrating research findings from the climate change science communication literature with those from the narrative policy framework’s (NPF) empirical climate change studies, five distinct suggestions for writing effective climate change stories emerge. For the NPF, policy narratives necessarily include characters and policy referents, but may also include plot, setting, policy solutions, as well as other yet-to-be identified components. The five suggestions for writing climate change stories are as follow. First, use narrative form and content when communicating climate change science. Second, identify audience characteristics and articulate the setting of the story (problem, cause, context) in specific, recent, and audience-relevant language. Third, using knowledge about audience beliefs and values, choose characters (heroes, villains, or victims) whom the audience can relate to and will care about. When casting characters, focus on relaying positive emotions associated with motivation and personal control instead of negative emotions associated with futility. Fourth, temporally link narrative components together with specific information about causality, risk, and human agency. Fifth, clearly identify the point of the story in terms of risks and benefits, emphasizing gains instead of losses, and referencing policy solutions with wide support if relevant. Employing such techniques may help correct suboptimal messaging structures that encourage cognitive resistance to scientific information, thereby facilitating information transmission to a larger segment of the population. Additionally, these techniques offer avenues for replicable research designs that may help to further advance the scientific understanding of climate change communication.

scholarly journals Design for Sustainability: The Need for a New Agenda

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (9) ◽  
pp. 3615
Author(s):  
Garrath T. Wilson ◽  
Tracy Bhamra
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Social Media ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Broad Spectrum ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Design For Sustainability ◽  
Single Use ◽  
Traditional Approaches ◽  
Global Agenda

Design for Sustainability is not the panacea we hoped it would be when it was first introduced in the latter part of the 20th century. Today, the health of both our environment and our societies is at a critical state, a breaking point, with piecemeal solutions offered as social-media-friendly rallying points, such as the European Parliament approved ban on single-use plastics, whilst fundamental, and arguably less ‘exciting’, issues such as loss of biodiversity, overpopulation, and climate change are shuffled to the back. It can be argued, however, that the awareness of the concept of sustainability and the need to reduce the negative human impact upon the environment and society has grown significantly and, consequently, has moved up the global agenda; this is evidenced by the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference. However, it is also clear that the role of Design for Sustainability within this agenda is not providing the solutions necessary to manifest the level of change required. Traditional approaches are not working. This Special Issue of Sustainability seeks to readdress this with eight papers that push the frontier of what Design for Sustainability could be—and possibly must be—across the broad spectrum of design disciplines.

scholarly journals Saw It on Facebook: The Role of Social Media in Facilitating Science Issue Awareness

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 205630512093041
Author(s):  
Julian M. Mueller-Herbst ◽  
Michael A. Xenos ◽  
Dietram A. Scheufele ◽  
Dominique Brossard
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Science Communication ◽  
Gene Editing ◽  
Network Heterogeneity ◽  
The Public ◽  
Final Sample ◽  
Communication Challenges ◽  
Information Landscape ◽  
The Impact

Spreading issue awareness about increasingly interdisciplinary scientific discoveries faces progressively larger communication challenges due to the complexity, innovation pace, and broad applicability of these innovations. Traditionally, the public relies on legacy media for information and discussion of science topics. In face of a changing information landscape, however, legacy media struggle with decreasing funding for their science desks, and science journalists turn to more specialized outlets, often online. Given these developments, it is important to understand which platforms besides legacy media serve as facilitators of science issue awareness. In this study, we analyzed the impact of social media on the awareness of gene editing. We used a representative survey administered by professional survey firm YouGov between December 2016 and January 2017, yielding a final sample of 1,600 US adults with a 41.7% response rate. The regression analysis findings suggest that social media is a significant avenue through which awareness of gene editing, and subsequently other scientific issues, is spread. Using the example of Facebook, we were able to demonstrate that how, rather than if, one uses social media is the determining factor in spreading issue awareness. Awareness was positively predicted by the length of social media sessions and network heterogeneity, while pure amount of sessions actually negatively predicted awareness. Legacy media remain an important predictor of gene editing awareness. These results demonstrate that social media functions as an important information space for science issues and should receive individual attention along with legacy media outlets when examining science communication.

scholarly journals Practicing Science Communication in Digital Media

2021 ◽  
pp. 69-81
Author(s):  
Katharina Meinecke
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Digital Media ◽  
General Public ◽  
Science Communication ◽  
Classical Antiquity ◽  
Research Communication ◽  
Classical Archaeology ◽  
University Of Vienna ◽  
The University ◽  
The City

Katharina Meinecke describes a form of ‘Practicing Science Communication in Digital Media: A Course to Write the “Antike in Wien” Blog and Distribute it in Social Media at the University of Vienna in 2017’. In order to make students familiar with research communication to a general public and to enable them to practice both analogue and digital outreach activities, Meinecke had students write a blog and share their work in social media. An additional aim of the course was to enhance the visibility of Classical Archaeology in Vienna by highlighting the relevance of Classical antiquity in the city until today through content created by the participants.

Methods for Assessing Online Climate Change Communication, Social Media Discussion, and Behavior

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leona Yi-Fan Su ◽  
Heather Akin ◽  
Dominique Brossard
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Social Media ◽  
Research Methods ◽  
Science Communication ◽  
Survey Methods ◽  
Online Communication ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Online Surveys ◽  
Climate Change Research ◽  
Research Fields

In recent years, increased Internet access and new communication technologies have led to the development of online methods for gathering public opinion and behavioral data related to controversial issues like climate change. To help climate-change researchers better adapt to the new era of online-based research, a review of, and methodological applications for, prevailing Internet-based research methods are provided here. Online surveys have become more common in the last decade for several reasons, including their relatively low administration cost, the pervasiveness of Internet communication, and declining response rates associated with traditional survey methods. Experiments embedded within online surveys have also become a useful tool for examining the extent to which online communications influence publics’ attitudes and behaviors. Other research methods that have gained growing attention from scholars are content analyses of online communication using big data approaches. By mining the seemingly infinite amount of user-generated content extracted from different social media sites, researchers are able to analyze issue awareness, responses to instant news, and emerging sentiments. This article provides a detailed overview of these Internet-based research methods, including their potential advantages and pitfalls, their applications in the science-communication and climate-change research fields, as well as suggestions for future research.

Reposting “till Albert Einstein is TikTok famous”: The Memetic Construction of Science on TikTok

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jing Zeng ◽  
Mike S. Schäfer ◽  
Joachim Allgaier
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Science Communication ◽  
Albert Einstein ◽  
Digital Culture ◽  
Science Content ◽  
Quantitative Content ◽  
Qualitative Thematic Analysis ◽  
Short Video ◽  
Media Applications

Since its launch in 2018, TikTok has become one of the fastest-growing social media applications in the world, being particularly popular among young people. Memetic videos, which often feature lip-syncing, dance routines and comedic skits, are a defining feature of the platform. This study used quantitative content analysis and qualitative thematic analysis to examine science memes, an increasingly popular genre on TikTok, by analysing 1368 TikTok videos that feature science-related content. The results of the study uncover the most influential creators of science-related content, the most prevalent content in science memes and three vernacular styles of science memes on TikTok. The results expand existing scholarship on science communication focusing on social media. Understanding the role of memetic science content on short-video platforms, as well as in the youth digital culture in general, also provides valuable insights into how science communicators can engage with the younger generation.

scholarly journals Secularism in science: The role of religious affiliation in assessments of scientists’ trustworthiness

2019 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 194-210
Author(s):  
Alexandra L. Beauchamp ◽  
Kimberly Rios
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
United States ◽  
Religious Affiliation ◽  
The United States ◽  
Negative Association ◽  
Religious Groups ◽  
Religiously Affiliated ◽  
Climate Change Science

With controversies surrounding numerous science topics, including vaccinations and climate change, science skepticism in the United States is of growing concern. Some skepticism of science may stem from the perceived association between science and atheism, as well as stereotypes of religious individuals as prosocial. Three studies examine how scientists’ religious affiliation (or lack thereof) influences perceptions of their warmth and trustworthiness among Christian participants. (Study 1 also includes atheist participants for comparison purposes.) Whereas atheist participants evaluate atheist scientists as more trustworthy than scientists from various religious groups (e.g. Christian, Jewish, and Muslim), Christian participants consistently evaluate atheist scientists as less trustworthy and less warm than religious scientists, and not exclusively Christian scientists. These effects are explained, in part, by Christian participants’ perceptions that atheist scientists are less motivated by prosociality compared to religiously affiliated scientists and, as Study 3 demonstrates, have a negative association with trust in scientists in general.

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