Regular listeners will remember the Science Online London gathering back in August. The day before, Mendeley hosted a pre-conference ‘fringe’ event, organized by Jenny. It turned out to be quite a wild evening, and there is video evidence of shenanigans.
One thing I remember clearly (some of you might be surprised I remember anything from that evening, but anyway) is David Colquhoun getting a tad rabid about PR. The gist was that science doesn’t need PR, it’s a waste of time and money; I don’t remember him saying explicitly PR people are professional liars but that was the impression I came away with.
I thought that was bollocks, and I still do.
PR is necessary not simply because scientists like to eat, and therefore need to be funded, and therefore need to convince various bodies (and by extension the people who influence those bodies) to give them money (and I want to talk a little about about ‘justification’ of research in another post) but also because there are crucial social and public health aspects of what we do. We don’t just have to convince the wider community that a particular piece of research is ‘correct’, but we need to demonstrate–somehow–that it directly affects their health (or their wallet, or whatever).
I’m reminded of this because a friend of mine sent me a link via Facebook last week, saying
Some (including me) would argue that the greatest battles against illness and suffering should be fought on the PR/HR front, rather than purely in the arena of science. You, O Great Stream Feeder in the Gyre of Science Publication, may well have already seen this: RT David McCandless RT @GreatDismal: Emotional Epidemiology Of H1N1
The article is from a medical doctor (or possibly here), and describes the reactions, preconceptions and attitudes of visitors to her clinic in the face of the H1N1 epidemic; or, as she describes it, Emotional Epidemiology. In brief, her patients at first demanded a vaccine against H1N1 (despite not wanting the seasonal jab…) and then, when the vaccine became available, refused it.
It certainly isn’t related to logic or facts, since few new medical data became available during this period. It seems to reflect a sort of psychological contagion of myth and suspicion.
Another report last week backs up my claim. The Daily Express reported that taking aspirin could “significantly reduce” age-related macular degeneration. Sounds great. But let’s see what the NHS has to say:
This is a well-designed and well-conducted study, the results of which have been incorrectly reported in the press. This study found that low-dose aspirin had no effect in preventing age-related macular degeneration, a common cause of sight loss in the elderly.
Far from being a significant reduction, the authors of the reported (large, double-blind) randomized controlled trial took pains to stress that there is no benefit. Indeed,
There are risks associated with taking daily or alternate-day aspirin, which should be weighed against the benefits. Elderly people, to whom this research will be most relevant, are most at risk of gastric irritation if they regularly use aspirin.
What’s going on, here?
In both cases, it’s a failure of PR. It’s not simply a matter of education. It’s a matter of getting things right, and getting that information out there, to the public–via the newspapers or schools or physicians in surgeries. Just as with anthropogenic global warming there is no (serious) debate about the science; it’s a matter of PR. And I know it’s difficult. I have no idea who Jo Willey is (apart from Health Correspondent for the Daily Trainwreck), but I would love to see the press release that she read. Because I also know that they are difficult to get right. On Monday I had to completely re-write a release that we were about to publish because the person who produced the copy got the message of the research completely wrong.
PR is necessary. And it’s hard; perhaps even harder than the science.
Christen, W., Glynn, R., Chew, E., & Buring, J. (2009). Low-Dose Aspirin and Medical Record–Confirmed Age-related Macular Degeneration in a Randomized Trial of Women Ophthalmology, 116 (12), 2386-2392 DOI: 10.1016/j.ophtha.2009.05.031
Well said. The ’emotional epidemiology’ of H1N1 is indeed a prime example of ‘PR gone wrong’ – the same thing is going on over here as well. Even sadder: it’s not happening for the first time, just type in ‘swine flu’ on Google Scholar…
There’s a whole heap of sorriness here, isn’t there? I mean, aside from everyone worrying they were “going to die”:http://network.nature.com/people/UE19877E8/blog/2009/04/27/in-which-i-remember-where-i-was-when-i-heard-–-or-possibly-not back in April, conflated with the anti-vaccine crowd… now it appears that Tamiflu is ineffective against complications.
We were here in 1976 I see.
Yeah, that’s one of the references I meant (I love JSTOR!). So in another three decades, will we be any further do you think?
{sobs}
I think scientists hate PR because PR releases/journalists are
alwaysso often wrong…of course you’re making a very valid point, it is far better to get accurate but accessible information out to the public than it isexterminate the professional liarsto ignore PR and try to avoid using it.But I’m pretty sure you share everyones frustration when certain newspapers (Well let’s face it, all of them) report totally misleading statements from hysterical organizations like jabs
I guess my thesis is that scientists need to embrace PR. Change it from within. DC isn’t helping.
Yep, too true.
Not being able to resist a dig at PR, non-scientists involved in PR have a responsibility to listen to what they are being told and to try to get it right (rather than just making something sensational up because it’s more interesting)…I’m not saying this is easy just that all of the responsibility can’t rest with us.
bq. PR have a responsibility to listen to what they are being told and to try to get it right (rather than just making something sensational up because it’s more interesting)
That’s actually quite insulting, you know.
So if you were going to create a PR machine from scratch to help better communicate the benefits of science, how would you do it? Would it be run by an independent organisation or something else and who or what would fund it?
It seems that there’s an obvious distrust of advice from sources that are perceived,in some way, to lack impartiality, but isn’t there also an in-built psychological element to advice-taking that prohibits us from doing what we’re told is good for us? For example, haven’t we all ignored advice from mothers/best friends about anything and everything from suitabilities of partners to whether to put up with that annoying boss for another month? Even when people have more experience than us, we’re not always that good at doing what they suggest is the most appropriate response. Maybe this applies just as much to taking advice from the hard facts of science as it does to the more subjective things in life?
I agree that it’s unrealistic to do away with PR in science and David was being a bit too polemic about the whole thing – but I suppose that’s what David does 🙂 But, as I think I pointed out at the FF event too, right now scientists don’t have much of an incentive to engage with PR people or with the public, and this is at least one reason why the relationship breaks down so frequently. It’s not productive to blame all misrepresentation of science in the media on PR folks. (I’d never seen that video before by the way, it’s great!)
I’d have to say that I disagree with Samantha implicitly. The responsibility HAS to rest with us. The primary researcher should be the one writing these press releases (if not at least checking them before dissemination). They are the ones with the greatest understanding of the study and results, so why should someone with no background in the subject matter be expected to write something comprehensive?
The bottom line is that the person who gets the funding for a study is responsible for all aspects of that study. This includes sharing the results with the world in a meaningful way.
is necessary. And it’s hard; perhaps even harder than the science
Richard G – It is more difficult, to make a particular item, you need good sources to be well informed and not that it is safe. You could almost say that you depend on others
thirdsto make a good article. While the author of a scientific paper depended on one.I wrote Nature’s press release, almost single-handedly, for a decade. It was valued in the community because it was, as a document, pretty reliable. These days Nature has a whole PR department which aspires to the same high standards. When I joined Nature, the quality of science PR was very spotty. I think it’s got a lot better in the past few years. Gone are the days when PR offices were staffed by brainless and chinless debs called Sacculina StJohn-Mollusc. Scientists should seek out the PR people in their institutions and be as nice as possible to them. The air of hostility that scientists might be tempted to adopt towards PR people might once have been justified – now it’s less so.
Indeed. Thanks for that, Henry. I think (although I have no data) that more and more scientists are moving into this side of the business. Especially today.
damn, hit submit too soon. I meant to say that we need them today, more than ever.
All very good points and @Richard didn’t mean that to be quite so insulting, sorry, oops!
But I do sympathize with DC’s frustration.
@Jonathan The primary researcher should be the one writing these press releases, some researchers, like Steve Wilson are doing this at least on their own webpages. I think this is a great idea but large numbers of people are not going to go looking for the information themselves you really need newspapers or TV…and then everything gets very mixed up and some newspapers do try to manipulate the story for the biggest scare factor because it sells more copies.
@Lou still musing on your questions. I was talking about this with a friend recently who pointed out that one of the hardest things to get across is the nature of doubt in science.
Maybe PR needs some PR
giggles
PR is necessary
That’s true not only in order to get funded but also (as Richard pointed out) because, really, kind of the point of science is to invent/find things to help people, and how will they be helped if we never tell them what we find? There will be a lot of misunderstandings but I guess we have to learn to live with that.
I took a course in communicating science and at the first day we were asked to picture a world were scientists had stopped all communication for some hundred of years. I think we all had visions of something resembling the darkest middle ages…So PR may be difficult but the alternative is worse.
Isn’t everything we communicate PR?
I work on the basis that a press release deserves at least as much attention as the abstract of the paper. Plus if you’re going to publish something the public will care about it’s worth thinking about spending 2 days – 2 weeks on the phone with journos giving them the background and helping them understand.
It’s almost always new to them so why would they understand it all immediately?
I happen to have attended my first two press conferences in the last couple of months – exciting times in our institute! In both cases I was involved in drafting the media backgrounders (with lots of input from experienced PR folks, who also wrote the final press releases). It was very interesting to see how the wheels turn from the inside, but I can see why scientists are so reluctant to get involved in this kind of thing. Doing it right takes a massive amount of work: constant fact-checking and corrections of text written by non-specialist PR-ers and journalists, plus the speeches written by/for politicians and representatives of funding agencies who will be presenting at the press conference, etc etc etc.
It was very cool to see my colleagues as the first item on the national news, although a wee bit disconcerting to turn on the local TV news over breakfast and see my boss being interviewed in the studio! My first instinct was to feel guilty for having Gmail open…
In a sense, Nat, most definitely.
That’s a fascinating exercise, Anna. And yes, getting it right is a lot of work, Cath. Rather than throw out the pellet with the supernatant, we need to devote more time and effort to it.
The primary researcher should be the one writing these press releases
Disagree completely. Almost all primary researchers that I know couldn’t write a press release that would be (a) short enough, (b) simple enough for the general public to understand, or (c) clear enough to avoid confusion. There are exceptions, I know.
PR, as RPG pointed out, is hard, which is why there are people with experience and/or professional qualifications in it. Yes, dealing with the PR folks can sometimes seem tricky or annoying, but revising what they’ve written is the way to go – let them frame it so it makes sense to the target audience, and check the scientific details when they ask you.
I totally agree that PR is important to science, but (like many have said already) our messages tend to get lost or misinterpreted. I think this is why we need to have scientists in these types of PR positions, someone who can speak the language of science and translate for the public (like Cath).
Fantastic point, Winty. The thing to remember, Alyssa, is that expertise is required, and while scientists in those positions might well be the way forward, they will need training. Unless they’re naturally as brilliant as Cath 🙂
It’s a bit like the question of becoming a computational biologist/bioinformatician: whether it’s ‘easier’ to start as a computer scientist and then learn wet stuff or rather to be a biologist who can learn Perl.
The question of the Perl before the biologist is an interesting one. I would like to think that PR can be learned by anyone, but not everyone can learn the science – I think it takes a certain “way” of thinking. But then again, I’ve met many scientists who’ve been hired to be marketers – if they are pushed to take the marketing courses and actively learn on their own, they become brillant, but if they think they can write a slogan just because they are able to draft their own abstract on a paper, they are often not correct.
I think PR is critical to science. Who hasn’t had their mom come to them, asking about “stem cells” or “DNA” and wanting to know what these terms really mean? (my parents are not scientists, in any way, shape or form). I’ve often had discussions about the way that science is reported in the media – for the most part it is well reported, however, there sometimes is an assumption made that people have the background to understand it. I know from my circle of friends, not all who are scientists, that really, science is seen as some mystical/magical thing that is only approachable by a few. I really think our education system is lacking in proper training that gets people excited about the science, such that they no longer see it as something “they don’t know”.
Are you referring to my time in marketing, Kyrsten? Don’t you know that I’m “naturally brilliant”? (allegedly).
I’m more of an interface between the scientists and the PR folk, rather than a straight PR person!
Neither flesh nor fowl nor good red herring?
@Cath, I wouldn’t dare speak of your time in marketing! Just spouting nonsense about other marketers that I’ve met since. I knew you’d see it and wonder if it was about you 😀
if they think they can write a slogan just because they are able to draft their own abstract on a paper, they are often not correct.
Sadly, I know too many of this variety.
Richard – although I think you are right in that point, I think scientists are trained to have a certain way of thinking or of looking at things. So, no matter what their background, they would have a better understanding of the processes, what would be important and what wouldn’t be so important to translate for the public, than someone without any science background at all.
Krysten – I think you bring up an excellent point about how science is seen/portrayed as mystical. I wonder if this is because of science education, or if the media doesn’t think the public will “get it”, so gloss over all the important science behind something?
Cath – I definitely didn’t mean that you were just a PR person, but someone who can help the PR people to translate the science to the public in a meaningful way 🙂
Sure. For the record, I think scientists should become PR pros rather than the other way around; and biologists should learn Perl.
Why can’t we all just get along? I don’t see why we have to try to create large numbers of PR/Scientists.
I’ve found it much more rewarding to work with the PR/Journo people. They know stuff, I know other stuff. The end product is better for it, surely?
A matter of respect? My analogy with bio/comp types might be further help here, but I might blog about that separately.
Interesting discussion! Actually I did say something to the effect that PR is (or can be) paid lying. I’d defend that because PR are people are required, and paid, to promote whatever message their client tells them to promote, whether it is true or not. That doesn’t do too much harm if the client is an honest scientist, rather than a dishonest, say, nutriceutical company. Sadly though, even honest scientists can be tempted to over-promote their message.
Working in a somewhat reconditite area, I haven’t had to deal with PR people very much. The last time was in connection with our 2008 Nature article (Lape et al., Nature 2008 Aug 7;454(7205):704-5). That got a lot of publicity (because it was in Nature, not because it was any more interesting to the public than anything else we write). A lot of time was wasted arguing about inadequate press releases and ‘making the paper’. It would have been much quicker and more accurate to write them ourselves (which was the outcome anyway, to a large extent).
I don’t believe that this is a trivial problem. One of the main reasons for public distrust of science is that we are seen as over-promoting what we do. We are suspected, in other words, of engaging in PR.
LouSamantha re: a science PR organization — take a look at the Australian Science Media Center: http://aussmc.org.au/ It’s a really intriguing model. It’s mission is to help support scientists talking directly to the media (finding them, prepping them etc). It manages to stay agenda-free in part b/c of its funding model. It’s funded by a consortium of private and public institutions (media, industry, universities and government agencies), but wont’ take more than 10-percent of their total funding from any one. It’s young (started in 2005) but seems to be building a strong track record of helping get the science out with accuracy and integrity. The half dozen scientists I’ve talked to who’ve worked with them are quite pleased with how their research has been reported.Thanks for your comments, DC. My memory of that evening was that you were a lot more, ah… virulent than your comment here 😉 Maybe that was the beer.
One of the main reasons for public distrust of science is that we are seen as over-promoting what we do. We are suspected, in other words, of engaging in PR.
I think too many people see PR as ‘promoting’ and not as ‘explaining’—and in science we have to do a lot of the latter to counteract the forces of the Daily Express &c. Don’t you agree?