Who Are You Writing for? Differences in Response to Blog Design Between Scientists and Nonscientists

Abstract

Science blogs have been advocated as potential mediators between science and nonscientist readers; however, they are mostly read by other scientists, with little research on how blogs can be made more appealing for nonscientists. We compared four possible treatments of a science blog post (text-only, humor, images and video). Nonscientists recalled more information when images were included compared to humor, while scientists performed worse with text-only than with video. Nonscientists enjoyed the images treatment most, while scientists preferred the video treatment. Adding images to blog posts is recommended as an easy method of increasing recall and enjoyment among readers.

Beyond reporting statistical significance: Identifying informative effect sizes to improve scientific communication

“…Although empirical work on this topic is still scarce, visual aids in combination with effect sizes might help making abstract information more accessible and intuitive to a wider audience (e.g., Gardiner, Sullivan, & Grand, 2018;Lazard & Atkinson, 2015). Such visual aids in combination with effect sizes could be reported in press releases or lay summaries of journals.…”

Video abstracts and plain language summaries are more effective than graphical abstracts and published abstracts

“…Recruitment was done using the snowball method used in studies similar to this research [10]. Participants were recruited online via the first author’s social media pages using appropriate hashtags.…”

“…Previous research on blogs which combined a written article with videos or graphics concluded that scientists had better recall and enjoyed the blog post more when a video was combined with the text whereas non-scientists had better recall and enjoyed the blog post more with an image included [10]. Research on support for the James Webb Space Telescope found that participants were more supportive of telescope construction when they viewed interactive media including a video and a simulation over traditional text [11].…”

Evidencing the efficacy of science blogging as a tool for science communication

“…Yet, the evidence base for sci-comms achieving these societal benefits remains underdeveloped (Stephens, 2022), with recent reviews recognising a scarcity of research providing empirical evaluation of the utility of sci-comms (Jensen & Gerber, 2020;Kappel & Holmen, 2019). A key aim of sci-comms content creators is to act as science explainers, translating science for non-specialist readers (Gardiner, Sullivan & Grand, 2018). To that end sci-comms creators strive to design materials likely to result in high levels of audience engagement often borrowing techniques from journalism and/ or creative professions (Olsen, 2013).…”