Nickie Fannin's Science Communication Blog

University of Oregon Lokey Laboratory

The University of East Anglia’s PR department is probably really scrambling this week setting up sensitivity training and putting out emails about the proper use of email after the New York Times printed an article about some hacked emails in which some climatology scientist wrote some rather inflammatory things including calling their climate change opponents “idiots” and using statistical “tricks.”

Sometimes, it is hard to be a scientist.

The root of it seems to be an us versus them attitude in the science community. Scientists are the great receivers of knowledge and everyone else … well, don’t worry your pretty little heads the scientist will tell you what’s going on.

These top-down communication models, even in the best circumstances, seem abusive.

It’s no wonder that scientists can’t get any traction on some major issues.

According to the Pew Research Center 32 percent of Americans polled accepted the idea of evolution, and 49 percent believed in global warming. Most scientists agree that there is a large knowledge gap.

Scientist should definitely look into a re-branding campaign.

Scientist like Albert Einstein, Louis Pasteur and Marie Curie are like rock legends but we need some more new stars that want to share with the public their work and their passion.

Will this ever happen? Will scientists willfully choose to descend from Olympus? I hope so.

Meanwhile I bet there’s an IT person who read this NYT article and thought “idiots.”

Picture of Lokey Laboratory courtesy of Wolfram Burner at Flickr.com.

I mean it — why should we care?

I have always been interested in honeybees and their wasp brethren since childhood, probably because my father was a beekeeper and amateur entomologist. So a couple of years ago when Haagen Daz put out a commercial about hive failure in bees, I took notice.

Since that time there have been a number of stories about hive failure in the local newspaper, Mother Earth News, Martha Stewart Living, a documentary titled “The Last Beekeeper,” and web videos of farmers in China pollinating crops by hand because of hive collapse.

Scientists still do not understand the cause of these collapses, although they suspect pesticides and the stressful conditions that the bees endure in long-distance transportation. Here in the Pacific Northwest, the  Oregon State University entomology department landed a government grant to study the phenomenon.

The loss of honeybees might deplete society’s food supply and result in a loss of man hours if Americans have to pollinate flowers by hand.

I don’t know what we, the public, should do about it. Should we all plant purple flowering plants in our yards; should we legislate against the use of pesticides; should we buy local honey; should we start home apiaries; or should we tackle and put in a headlock anyone we see harming a bee? I’m not sure.

Public relations teachers tell students to ask “to what effect” when writing a plan. Sometimes the effect looked for is an increase in awareness among the public. What good is increased awareness?

That’s a lot of questions, but as a public relations student it’s my job to ask questions. I read recently that most media serves to inform not educate. As we use more social media — which is less objective, more built upon relationships, and perceived as trustworthy — these types of amorphous objectives will change.

Let me suggest that we begin to ask ourselves what we specifically want people to do with their newly found knowledge.

How can people help the honeybees?

Photograph: courtesy of bugman50@flickr.com

H1N1. Every day I hear worrying news about H1N1. The president declared a “national emergency.” Pharmaceutical companies cannot produce enough vaccine. Nightly news shows highlight people on death’s door with influenza. Even my doctor told me that although he will get the vaccine for himself and his kids when it is available, he believes we will have all contracted the virus by then … great.

With this kind of news at the beginning of flu and cold season it’s hard not to freak out.

And then I received a pamphlet from the Oregon Department of Human Services, and the worry decreased to a dull roar.

I give this communication tool an A plus. The tri-fold pamphlet printed in a soothing gray provides not only information on symptoms and states that for most people the best medicine is “rest and nutrition,” but also gives a list of symptoms for adults and children that would require a visit to the office. I really appreciate the latter because in particular, I want to know what is too sick. It also talks about the risks associated with both H1N1 and regular influenza. The writers even repeat some of the more vital information throughout the text.

I posted the symptom checklist on my refrigerator to be posted for the duration of cold and flu season. For more information please check the DHS site http://flu.oregon.gov. or other healthcare sites www.flu.gov and www.who.int.

I fell in love with science.

Literally, I fell into a tide pool at the Oregon Coast on a trip for a field biology class. My classmates and I were standing on rocks covered in slick green seaweed. The hard, heavy rain blew straight into our faces. I was in a small group trying to classify a crab.With the crab key disintegrating in one hand and  Mr. Escape Crab in the other, I lost my balance and fell into the pool. My favorite blue pea-coat ruined, my rear end scraped by a rock, everything I brought down to the rocks wet from the sea or rain, and I thought: This is the best trip ever. I changed my major to biology and public relations.

Since then I have been passionate about science in media. How are scientific ideas represented? How and how effectively is the information translated? What are the obvious messages and what are the hidden messages? I have found that often media are not clear about science. The sciences might seem daunting to some writers and public communication might be a nightmare to some scientists, but I believe that there are good ways to communicate useful information to the public. That is what I will explore in my blog.

So here I am with my blue pea-coat on, and I am ready to fall again.