I was fortunate enough to eye an article cycling through my Twitter feed this morning that piqued my interest by title alone, Scientific [Mis]Communication. Satisfyingly, my initial reading of Dave Munger’s well-stated entry justified my intuition completely.
True to its name Munger’s article tackles the issue of communication—specifically communication by scientists—in an effort to emphasize areas of neglect. The basis for Munger’s thoughts stem from an analysis written by Matt Ford of Ars Technica which discussed a case study published in PNAS, where “scientists explained the communication efforts behind establishing a marine reserve off the California coast”.
As I was reading along the following sentences of Munger’s article really stuck with me as both applicable and poignant in my quest to grow into a more effective communicator.
“. . . Ford says the researchers identified four major components of successful communication: Understanding the audience, determining the message, deciding on strategies, and measuring success. While these may seem relatively obvious, I’d submit that most science communicators ignore the first and last points. Without knowing your audience, you’re going to have a hard time choosing an effective strategy for conveying your message. And while they may be concerned with the impact factor of journals they publish in, many scientists don’t take the time to assess the influence of their papers after publication.”
Suffice it to say, I think Munger’s assertions certainly hit the nail right on the head. However, to interject my own opinion for a moment, I do not find that it is only scientists who ignore the first and last points. I’d say omission of these two tenets recurs as a universal failure in communication regardless of one’s field.
How we Communicate
Within the context of Nuclear Fissionary, I’d like to attempt an honest analysis at how we are (not?) addressing the four points outlined above.
Understanding the Audience
Our intended purpose is to educate an audience of laypeople about the cost-effectiveness, science, safety, and overall potential of nuclear energy. Interestingly, we have seen very active (and welcomed) comments and discussion by very knowledgeable people who are closely tied to nuclear energy in one form or another. In most respects our audience is far more knowledgeable than our authors (certainly me).
At such an early stage in our site’s existence it is difficult to ascertain whether or not our purpose is finding its intended audience. Jumping ahead it becomes apparent that point one is most certainly intertwined with point four—measuring success (more on that later).
Determining the Message
This one is easy: Nuclear Energy is clean—safe—reliable. It is inexpensive, abundant, and wrongfully feared.
Deciding on Strategies
Our aim is to honestly and fairly deliver the positive message of nuclear energy in a simple manner which is easy to understand by people of modest educational backgrounds.
We strive for a web interface that is visually pleasing, easy to use, and free of distraction.
Our primary strategy for targeting laypeople is via search. Through search engine optimization (SEO) we have instituted numerous best practices with the intention of steadily increasing our placement on the search engine results page (SERP) over time. Through favorable placement among highly competitive keywords we will have the chance to funnel in an audience that is looking to learn about nuclear energy.
Measuring Success
Aside from our great commentators, Google Analytics statistics, fans likes on Facebook, mentions by other bloggers in the pro-nuclear community, and our followers on Twitter, it is difficult to measure our success as it relates to communicating to our audience. Part of this difficulty arises from our site’s young age, but the reality of the situation is that it is very difficult to quantify who exactly is consuming our information.
Beyond the strongly loyal and well-respected inner circle of pro-nukes, it is hard to know how our message is performing because there is no discernable feedback. This should hardly comes as a surprise though since it is quite abnormal for people to comment who have no real incentive to do so. Understanding the reticence that many may feel in leaving comments on sites, we must establish another method to quantify success; otherwise we may have to reconsider our intended audience, message, and strategies for successful communication.
We must find out if the silent visitors to our site truly are engaged.
Questions for the Community
But enough about us, I’d love to hear thoughts from our readers about the communication breakdown addressed in Dave Munger’s article. Do you find the four points useful and practical? Do you disagree? Regardless of your opinions toward Munger, I’d really love to hear how you all are measuring success with your own ventures.
Image Credit
Foucault’s Pendulum courtesy of Flickr user sylvar published under the CC license.
Looking forward...
26 Comments
“I’d love to hear thoughts from our readers about the communication breakdown addressed in Dave Munger’s article. Do you find the four points useful and practical? Do you disagree?”
Whether I agree or disagree, I’m pretty sure this is something we need to talk about. The nuclear industry does not have the same capability as the anti-nuclear movement to reach the masses, obviously.
Meanwhile, one keep asking himself: why do the public dosen’t understand us? Do ours results justify change?
This is, for me, an unevitable question if we want to change the situation.
@Alex555, I agree with you 100% when it comes to questioning why the public doesn’t understand us. It’s easy to blame it on the media, it’s easy to blame it on anti-nuclear mobilization (which is loud and proud). But to a certain degree I feel those are easy, cop-out answers. The situation is what it is (hate that phrase) and we need to look to ourselves to overcome these obstacles.
The media will continue the fear-mongering coverage as long as the rating are there, just as the anti-nuclear side will keep clamoring away as long as there are people willing to be scared. It’s our job to help erode the foundation that this environment rests upon.
“The situation is what it is (hate that phrase) and we need to look to ourselves to overcome these obstacles. ”
An interesting I’ve given though is that:
Is it the anti-nuclear movement that spread panic or the pro-nuclear movement?
Of course, just saying that the nuclear industry would shoot itself in his foot is completely stupid but the more I think about the more it seems what it is.
One have to think: How does panic spread? How people get a scare in general? For me, it is kinda obvious that just being with people that are scare is in itself scary.
“It is night and a bunch of strangers walks in the park. You can feel how people are unease about this new group, especially the ones you are close with. You can see THEY feel bad about the newcomers. You can see there is some kind of “malaise”/unease. Your group dosen’t want to stick there.”
It’s kinda hard to explain, but the newcomers haven’t said a SINGLE word here. Your buddies too: they are just scare. Now that is scary, its so scary, they don’t even talk about it!
The anti-nuclear movement dosen’t feel good about nuclear power, that’s why everyone are scare. Don’t look for any “tactics” are any “battle plans”, that’s just being plain panicked, nothing more. You panic, everyone panic, EVEN if you don’t want to panic, that’s survivals instincts.
*An though interesting I’ve given is that:
I keep doing typos, that kinda ruin the message.
*An interesting idea I’ve think about is that:
…
Alex, I understand where you are going with the idea of panic and fear spreading through the group. It is similar to the concept driving groupthink where over time the entire unit will develop a common identity that is ultimately to the detriment of the group.
Considering this, what is your recommendation? Is it to keep people away from the group that will scare them—e.g. anti-nuclear folks? Or is it that the pro-nuclear side should act as a calming influence to those that are scared?
The source of the scare is the nuclear industry, they behave in a way that make people scare, notably the anti-nuclear groups. These groups are emotional and likely to be scared first (i.e. global warming , global warming alarmists, all that stuff came from them)
If you shoot blank bullets in a crowd, and your buddies splat ketchup on them, it will cause a panic, kill people, even if blank bullets and ketchup are harmless.
I am referring to the “bad guys exemple”:
“but the newcomers haven’t said a SINGLE word here”
You know, somebody detach from the group and go meet you and your buddies.
-Hey, Robert, lol, I didn’t know it was you. You scared me shitless here I though you was some random guy. lol.
The nuclear industry keep using, logic, data, analysis and critical though to resolve the situation.
Wrong:
The sentiment of discomfort keep getting bigger and bigger and no data or critical thinking will resolve the emotional status. Furthermore, it is known that stress block reasonning… as love block critical though because as we all know, love is blind.
The nuclear industry must get on an emotional level to solve emotional concern.
That is, why, the discour, keep getting emotional, it, is, what, they want, simple.
You have to reckonize that human emotions will always come back until you understand them and the most important thing: accept them.
Note: As I surely have typos, I’ll try to post a correction as soon as I spot them.
Note aside:
“Is it to keep people away from the group that will scare them—e.g. anti-nuclear folks?”
Very dangerous, coercion or manipulation of human emotions will lead to chaos, self-destruction and short-circuiting the human brain.
Don’t try to play to god, the heart will decide himself what is the right thing to do.
Knowing your auidence is key. In my opinion the target should be high school teens. They are being targeted by the anti- nukes. Answering the questions they have would answer most others as well. You have a great site and I link it before atomicinsights so that new people coming to nuclear power can get simple clear answers. There is a great temptation to think that a simple answer is wrong because it is not nuanced. An answer is wrong if continued study leads to an opposit conclusion. So a simple answer that is sufficent for the audience invites futher study.
Hi David, starting young is certainly starting smart in this context and you are 100% right. If people learn the facts and learn them while they’re young the chance for brainwashing goes right out the window.
However, there’s a problem…
How are we going to reach-out to high school students? Realistically, are teens going to be sitting around with their friends, watching MTV, and all of the sudden feel compelled to go search Google for information on nuclear energy? I would love to think so but that is giving teens way to much credit (and I don’t intend that as a knock on them).
So, if we are going to execute this kind of outreach, our message is going to have to filter into the classroom. We will need the science curriculum to be the deliverer of nuclear’s message. Unless of course we can somehow make nuclear energy the “cool” thing for kids, which would be great, but incredibly difficult I think.
Hi Greg,
Most High School teens are assigned various reports on “Green” issues as writing assignments. Your clean site has good basic information that is clearly presented. As long as that information comes up on a web search Teens will be reading. I found myself in a dialogue with a teen who had studied enough biology to talk like a researcher.
I do talk with teens about this. I pass on the A is For Atom and give a basic “science lesson” about the splitting of an atom. I show them something that shows the difference in size between uranium and the equivalent power. They are interested and having a website like yours to point them to is a great back up.
By aiming at a Teen, you are aiming at an audience that is intelligent and engaged but not informed. They need basic beginning information. Your first series of articles were fantastic in this regard and I think they need to be repeated fairly often and perhaps linked to in a FAQ. This means that information presented needs to have links to original sources for authenticity.
So, in my opinion you are already on the way to this target audience. Teens are not looking for MTV when they are doing reports. They are looking for a slick presentation that is well documented with a positive tone.
Hey David,
I really like your idea about incorporating an FAQ page on this site. Going to start brainstorming a way to do that in the most effective way possible. I think this would be a necessary site enhancement and it gives Jack, Jason, and myself something very valuable to work on.
Thanks again, excellent idea!
Hi Greg,
Your “Dummies” series is great! I have learned a good deal from them. These very basic stepping stones are key to understanding the context of reporting from other sites. You were doing a very very good series on Radiation Dangers. We still need to hear about the relative exposures and dangers of medical / and or airport xray machines.
I like your themes at the top bar. These sort excellently.
Thanks for your good site and I am looking forward to seeing how you take this good site and make it even better
“The source of the scare is the nuclear industry”
Partially true. The nuclear industry has a tendency to behave in such a way that even the most minor fault gets a lot of attention, and they do this very publicly.
This is the right behavior from an safety standpoint – a false positive is /always/ better perceived than a false negative when the potentially missed negative is radiological release.
However, from a political standpoint, this extra caution causes an exaggerated perception of the risks of the technology – it seems like there’s an “emergency” every week at nuclear plants.
The media doesn’t – can’t – help with this; if a plant says that a tritated water leak caused a 17,000 pCi / l measurement in their detection wells, the media hears, “radiation was released and it was a high number, in the thousands!”
Real meaning: “We have wells set up under the plant, and far away from public waters, for early detection of leaks. We got a reading of about 2 parts per quadrillion of a low activity isotope, indicating that there’s a crack in a secondary or tertiary cooling pipe. A due diligence check of upstream and downstream public waters of the plant indicates no tritated water has escaped the groundwater. Because of NRC regs, we must tell the public about all potential radioactive releases, even releases that won’t result in exposure to the public even approaching that of a single banana. We’re in the process of fixing it now, and there is no danger to the public whatsoever.”
Part of it is selection of units. I know it seems dishonest as an engineer, and that keeping the same order of magnitude allows for easy visual comparison – but if it’s something that’s not terrible but could be percieved as bad, I think it’s OK to jump a unit. 17 nCi/l sounds a lot closer to the actual danger imposed by the material than 17,000 pCi/l, even though they represent the same number.
I was asked on Twitter what 17 nCi/l of tritium meant. I told them: imagine you had about the volume of a grain of salt in 100% tritium water. Divide that into 25 bits. Now, drop each bit into an olympic sized swimming pool. That’s the level of contamination that is being talked about. 2 parts per quadrillion.
I am so happy to see this article! As one of your “silent readers”, I am a repeat offender. I search the sci and tech section often. As an artist, I use the same four points to get my work/ message out to the public. Audience is the most important, in my opinion. When working with other artist, I ask “who are you speaking to and are they even in the room?”
Virginia, you really nailed it with your “are they even in the room?” analogy. This is going to be the big key for all of us: getting people eager to learn, in our virtual room. One thing’s for sure, the PopAtomic artwork will go a long way with achieving that end.
I’m an 18 year old Australian currently completing my last year of high school. During time there, I have had two teachers, one of whom was a Greenpeace member, spread anti-nuclear lies to students. One of the teachers was convinced that Chernobyl killed hundreds of thousands, and that Nuclear plants constantly release extremely radioactive coolant water. The other was convinced that Chernobyl exploded like a Nuclear weapon. If either teacher mentioned Nuclear energy, the end result was that most of the class would become anti-nuke acolytes. I have also been told by other students that wind and solar can replace reactors. Mind you, that last example was even after a Physics project on Nuclear energy – that evidently did not change any of these opinions. Given Australia does not even have a single power reactor, I can only guess that the propaganda much worse in the US. In any case, remember, this is the stuff that (presumably) your children are learning. I’m happy I escaped unscathed, practically with a chip on my shoulder against these loons, and since learning the truth I am probably the biggest Nuclear advocate on the planet… (I want to study Nuclear engineering next year but that isn’t really possible in Australia.)
I don’t know what you can take from this, though. More often than not the teacher doesn’t know a huge amount on the subject, so the students often can get away with Googling answers and rewriting the first few links in their own words. If you really want to reach out to students studying nuclear energy for a school project, then you’re probably going to need a page that is high in the list of Google search items for ‘Nuclear energy’ with easy and concise facts and analysis of energy. Although I understood everything on this site and most others (e.g. BraveNewClimate) at the time I was doing the project on Nuclear energy I wanted to get the information as quickly as possible, hence I did not want to read perhaps a dozen pages on the subject to base the report on. If I found a source that had an answer hidden within a dozen pages, I would skip it and find something that narrows it down. Make sure everything is clear and concise. Or you could add a “too long; didn’t read” section to teach report that basically summarizes everything in a couple of sentences.
Also it’s probably a good idea to emphasize that the website is independent of the Nuclear energy industry, I usually don’t use sources that are not independent.
Thanks.
Hi Scott, thanks for the great story, you clearly have a good head on your shoulders. It is refreshing to know that despite the best efforts to undermine the facts your teachers were not able to scare you into the camp of disbelief.
Obviously competing for the Nuclear Energy keyword would be great, but there is a very real obstacle with that; it is highly competitive. There are tens of thousands of web pages vying for that keyword and it takes time and a high Pagerank to achieve a top-notch position with Google.
Now, you mentioned clear and concise information as being critical. Do you find this site too detailed or too in-depth?
Thanks for the thoughts and we home you come back again. Best of luck in your pursuit of Nuclear Engineering.
Hi Greg,
I think the site has a good depth backing up the statements. But a summary, like a FAQ, of basic physics and economics would be helpful. I would do these in the “fear priority” that is, the most common fears answered first.
1. Dangerous – Nuclear Energy has proven safer than any industry in history. While there are still occasionally a small errors these are more like having a flat tire on a car than having the gas tank blow up. Fix the tire keep going. In fact, now Nuclear power plants replace the tires before they go flat. Highways kill about 34,000 people a year. Nuclear power plants have killed less than a 1,000 in 60 years. (I am pulling the last number from memory since I am running out of time before heading to work).
2. Radiation – Inside the reactor is very high and dangerous, but we know how to protect ourselves from this and we do it so well that standing outside the reactor, even inside the building has less radiation than you get just sitting in your chair at home.
3. Cost, To build a nuclear power plant is expensive. About the same cost as building 250 miles of highway. Nuclear plants can last between 40 to 80 years so this is a long term investment. Highways only last between 10 to 20 years. Both need maintenance.
4. Waste – Reduce, reuse, recycle. While the number of “tons” of waste is often quoted and the long term danger of the waste. Simple comparisons would be helpful. Is is more likely I will die from eating food contaminated by bacteria or by radiation from nuclear waste. What are the numbers?
These kind of FAQ will greatly help. I am also not an expert in these areas, I only know what I have been able to research using web tools, but by using multiple sources and doing the math on some claims. I am comfortable that Atomic Power is the “Silver Bullet” to our energy needs.
It’s not at all too detailed or too in depth. But as David said, it would be nice if there was a FAQ (or key-points) page containing a couple of key facts on each subject, which are hyperlinked to the already fantastic articles on Nuclear – somewhat similar to the table of contents on Wikipedia pages. I think it would help people get information that they are specifically looking for, very quickly which would help with the message.
Also, I think you should change the titles of one page in particular to something more positive – ‘Coal Creates Bigger Environmental Disasters than Nuclear’ to “Coal, the real environmental disaster” (as Jason Correia on facebook said).
Thanks.
Ever since David brought up the idea of the FAQ I have been thinking of a good way to implement it. Good in the sense of: fits into the design, easy to find, easy to navigate; that sort of thing. It will take some time and I do not want to rush it. I want to do it and do it right. I’ve been thinking of ultimately redesigning the site anyway and perhaps this can serve as motivation to get on that project.
Hi Greg,
The link should only cover the word “highway” Thanks for fixing that
Looking forward to the FAQ and more articles!
David Phillips
Hi Greg,
Sorry for the continuous link in my post. I missed the close link evidently.
I would love to see your rework. You have a great design now. Take the time to do it well and we will all be thankful.
I can edit the comment if you tell me where you want the link to close.
I see Jack has been slacking, lately! I miss his low-key, not-in-your-face, style. You and Jason are doing a fantastic job.
The idea of spreading the word to the younger generation is right on target. While Jack will be giving his presentation at the local Rotary Club this week, it would be good if he could put together a presentation for high school students who are being fed mis-information from many of their left-leaning teachers.
I’ve been looking forward to Jack’s presentation since I first heard about it. And I am really getting the sense that preparing a lesson plan for teachers is a great idea. Perhaps we could build some sort of online learning module for students. That would make it easily accessible in the classroom and in the home.
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