I know – I said I’d comment on this the day after it appeared – but it’s been a hell of a week!
I’ve had the chance to watch it, and absorb comments from my colleagues at STEMPRA, and arguments about it being ‘science-lite’ aside (it was just a one-hour programme after all) the key issue that it raised for me was the continued importance – no, essentiality – of maintaining good relationships between scientists, their press officers and the media (in whatever format that takes).
Some scientists are guilty of engaging poorly outside their immediate academic environs, and the sad consequence of that is that really good research goes unreported or, worse still, inaccurately reported.
We encourage our scientists to develop relationships with the media in conjunction with us. We instill within them the need to allow us to ‘translate’ their findings into words that are acceptable to the media and its audiences (better we do it than rely on others to do it for us), and the need to find ways of making their findings ‘real’ to the outside world (most of our work is in health science, so we always try to find real life case studies that reflect the issues raised by the research).
I’m going to leave the last word to Fiona Fox from the Science Media Centre, not least because she is ideally placed to comment, but also because what she says always makes immense sense! Here’s her take: “Most of the SMC loved Horizon and felt the last 10 minutes – where he summarises his message to scientists – was more or less the soundtrack to the SMC. That in a world where bloggers, columnists, politicians and protest groups are ever more adept at using new and old media to get their voices heard, scientists need to learn the rules of the game and get stuck in (even if that risks annoying their peers). That message, from the man who now leads UK science, is a powerful one and will help all of us still struggling with scientists whose response to attack is still to dive below parapet – and I saw that happen during Climate-Gate so this is a live issue 10 years after GM and MMR.”
