A new SciencePerspective highlights the ongoing challenge of communicating science online: '...conquering this challenge will require partnerships among the scientific community, social media platforms, and democratic institutions.' ScienceAndSocialMedia
Almost a decade ago, we wrote, “Without applied research on how to best communicate science online, we risk creating a future where the dynamics of online communication systems have a stronger impact on public views about science than the specific research that we as scientists are trying to communicate” . Since then, the footprint of subscription- based news content has slowly shrunk.
The business-as-usual response to this challenge from many parts of the scientific community—especially in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics fields— has been frustrating to those who conduct research on science communication. Many scientists-turned-communicators continue to see online communication environments mostly as tools for resolving information asymmetries between experts and lay audiences .
Unfortunately, social science research suggests that rapidly evolving online information ecologies are likely to be minimally responsive to scientists who upload content—however engaging it may seem— to TikTok or YouTube. In highly contested national and global information environments, the scientific community is just one of many voices competing for attention and public buy-in about a range of issues, from COVID-19 to artificial intelligence to genetic engineering, among other topics.
One challenge is for scientists to break free from informational homophily. Since the early days of the internet, the scientific community has had a very spotty track record of harnessing the full potential of online communication tools to reach beyond an audience that already follows science and meaningfully connect with those who disagree with or feel disconnected from science.
This is not to say that the scientific community has not become more sophisticated in understanding how different audiences find and make sense of information from online sources .