The problem may be more complicated:

1) Does society/public know that many novel solutions in every day life and their lower price are result of complicated research?

2) Does society/public is aware that in developed countries national income depends on level of know-how and is related indirectly with level of the scientific research?

3) Does society/public know, that even very basic theoretical research may in the future influence quicked development of technology, quality of life and/or national income?

4) Does society/public thinks that governmental (=public, common) money spend on research are spend reasonably?

General opinion and awareness is important and not always depends on scientists.

To communicate with the general masses one needs to have texts and research written in laymen's language. For the same the research needs time and space to create them like Albert Einstein did when he wrote Relativity, which was in easier language without the mathematical rigmarole of pure mathematics. Similarly when Richard Feynman was given an opportunity he came with the brilliant lectures on physics which is treated as a good cookbook for any one who wants to peep into world as physicists see it. In the same trend, Walter Lewin wrote his book, For the love of Physics. These are only few of the examples.

The problem with the scientific community is not communication ability but the issue of 'PUBLISH or Perish'. Who won't like to spend time with a research, nurture it, nourish it and then simplify it and make it easy so that old granny could also enjoy it. But the problem is time and this rage to publish has kept the joy of sharing research with non-tech community (as I call it) on the back burner.

It's never that scientists or technologists are poor communicators. Besides I won't deny few researchers who behave like robots and their communication sounds binary.

Research-General Public-Modern Research

Dear Dr.Girish

There is no thumb rule that General Public can understand anything

except that the general public have good knowledge on the particular domain.

if i explain a research on "bicycle wheel" such that "my research is to reduce the total weight of bicycle by using different materials for wheels".

since bicycle is very familiar application - General Public may visualize the outcome of the research.

if i explain a research on "Nuclear Reactor Cooling Techniques". for general public i should start from basic thermal engineering to Applications of Heat Transfer which is very time consuming process as well as there is no confidence at the end of explanation General Public may understand the concept or not.

if they understand they may appreciate if not they say "Useless Job". in that context it is not necessary to explain or try to explain the research with which General Public are not connected to.

General Public are not interested on Ongoing Research but they are very much interested upon the products from successful research only.

please comment on my view.

@ Majid, Raja: So should be necessary research explanation of the latest research on the level and language of soap opera and tabloid newspaper? And what about people who do not read any books or newspapers, but vote and influence general policy? Put post-it cards on every product "This TV set (mobile phone, car) is so comfortable (quick, cheap) thanks to research founded by the government"?

Hi all,

in any communication system there is a source and a target, in between there is some for of transmission. This question addresses all three. If the target cannot communicate with the source (through say bias mismatch or impedance mismatch) then things get messed up. In the communication you are talking about one side (the source) uses language that the other side ( the public) do not understand. We then use signal conditioning (the press) to impedance match, but they are selective filters who only pass what they think will sell advertising space in their magazines, papers or on TV. Then of course there is the sensationalisation that some press like (e.g MMR jabs, Global Warming arguments, nuclear power). Hence we have an issue:

How do we get across complex ideas using non-complex, jargon free language?

How do we get a complex idea across that avoids the press being able to cherry-pick and destroy the message?

How do we influence governments to provide education in sciences for the general public that is not superficial?

Most large companies have PR companies working for them to do just that: what do we do in science? Do it ourselves or even worst use a university PR department that would not cut the mustard in any industrial quarter. Does the same apply to our institutions? Probably yes as well. So, the answer is plain and simple, until we get a scientific PR machine working to the same level as, say, Apple or Microsoft then we will always be playing catch up.

I do not think the scientific community is any different to any other community, apart from we seem to be arrogant enough to think that we are.

A good question though....and I cannot wait to see the rest of the discussions.

If your research result is not translatable to ordinary language, it is simply worthless. A lot of effort should go into explaining why your research is important, the context and possible impacts. Larger universities in Sweden demand, for instance, that a summary of your thesis should be written in popular science style (in swedish) but not longer than an A4 page. This could be one reason why Sweden produce more patents per capita than most countries in the world. Even ordinary people have a crude idea on what is going on. Indirectly, the public is our customers and employers, they have the right to know where their money goes to.

Well, research *is* a cumulative process (shoulders of giants and all that), made even faster by the huge networking capabilities offered by today's media.

On the other hand, the amount of scientific knowledge that the general public is expected to possess in order to live a self-aware and profitable citizenship does not increase at the same pace. It is objectively hard for a non-scientist to keep up with the rate of research per-unit-of-time being developed nowadays. This should not be used as an excuse, in any case. We're answerable to the general public, much as politicians (and possibly more).

The statement is in fact NOT true. Some esteemed colleagues of mine vigorously participate in the public debate (and successfully, too), and while doing so they communicate their research in quite simple terms. It IS doable - it just requires a lot of thought, AND respect for the audience.

Mind you, I have read the famous book "Amusing Ourselves to Death" by Neil Postman (later also borrowed by Roger Waters as a theme for his great "Amused to Death" album) in which it is quite convincingly established that people in general simply cannot anymore listen to something more complex than a commercial or watch a game show ... :-)

I know many excellent science communicators but their government funding is often specifically for scientific research, should science communication costs be incorporated into government research grants?

Many scientists voluntarily disseminate their work, in laymen's terms, via social media. I, for one, am grateful for the many unpaid hours that are spent making science accessible to non-scientists, it means that I can easily enjoy science outside of my field.

Some scientists are poor communicators, just as are some plumbers and some librarians, but maybe some of them just don't have the opportunity to communicate in the manor you suggest. How would you suggest their work could be made accessible to the general populous? Who will publish these works and how will it be paid for.

The trade-off is between simplicity and correctness of information. Lay language is based on an average person's intuition, which is built upon daily, naked-eye experiences. Thus, the better a field of science is supported by daily experiences, the easier it is to put in lay terms. For example, classical mechanics is highly intuitive (e.g., higher acceleration for a car means higher fuel consumption), because it deals with large objects and low speeds (which we can observe directly). By contrast, quantum mechanics completely defies such intuition (is not observed day to day by the naked eye), and is therefore much more difficult to explain in lay terms.

Excellent question.

I'd like to quickly comment on Christina's comment from a UK perspective. Proposals for project funding from UK research councils (analogous to the NSF in the US) now have to include a detailed explanation of how the wider (non-academic) world will benefit from their research. Public communication of science can be a part of that (in fact, we can bid for funding for it as part of the project proposal). Also, block funding from the UK government is now partially tied to the level of 'impact' that a university's research has on those outside academia. I put the word 'impact' in quotation marks because it has to be measurable (and, preferably, score highly) according to a particular set of rules, so not all impact is 'impact'!

Clearly, the researchers that can connect well with the wider world are in a good position to benefit from such policies.

I have short out some statements regarding this question..

1.Many scientists don’t approve of communicating with non scientists.

2.Many scientists don’t expect themselves to be able to communicate.

3.Many scientists see themselves as outside the communication process.

4.Many scientists don’t notice when they have gone beyond their expertise.

5.Many scientists forget to start where their audience is.

6.Many scientists do not trust the public.

7. Many scientists disavow their own emotions. This may lead them to project their emotions onto the public and the media.

I guess the problem is much more with the "general public" than with the scientists.

Dear Girish,

As a scientist I do not have this problem.

I think that you have to talk with the general public in their language without losing your scientific approach.

@Vitaly: I disagree on the second part. The general public has a right to decide, as we are spending their money (through taxes etc.). However, I see a differentiation between fundamental research and applied research, since otherwise we would only be looking for cosmetic enhancements for the "rich and beautiful" or the newest gadgets for a soap opera audience.

I don't think that todays research is any more complicated than past research was, compared to the times when it took place. As time progresses, current state-of-the-art and leading-edge will become general knowledge and basics at some point in the future.

Obviously, as stated before, there is a difference in scientific language and laymen's language. The 'AHA' for myself came some years ago, with an article in Time Magazine, where a computer savy tech guy had to explain the usage of an Apple Mac to his dad. This happened some time around 1990! Today, my mom (80+ years old) has her own laptop, roaming the internet in search of new things to learn. And she has never been associated with computers until some 10 years ago. So why should the general crowd nowadays be any less capable of understanding science in the future. And to me, it is a sign of plain arrogance, if I should deem the general public less capable of understanding things.

Returning to the actual question "Why are scientists (technologists and researchers) poor communicators with the general public?". This is the same to any specialist (myself included, and I think also holds true for economists, ...). Specialists tend to communicate with their own kind, therefore being used to using their own language. When talking to people outside this circle, they/we have to learn to use a different language. Some have a natural capability for this, others need to be made aware and taught.

Not sure if A. Einstein actually said "If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough." but I think this to be quite true.

My 2cts

I work in a research institute that’s probably the one that more carefully look after communicating science in my country: it runs a web tv, it is very active in relations with press and media, schools visit very frequently our labs, etc.

Though most of our experiences are satisfactory, my colleagues and I personally experienced the difficulty of communicating to media. I sometimes have the impression that journalists, politicians (and common people in general) understand what they “want” to understand, often trying to exploit and use the science’s voice for their own ends. On the other hand, some scientists also accept it and try to say what the audience likes, politicians included, for their own ends or in order to attract more funds.

This kind of perverse mutual misunderstanding can lead to disaster and tragedy, for example in case of natural hazard risk management. I think this was the case of the L’Aquila earthquake. Scientists made their own mistakes speaking technical words that local politicians and the communities could not understand. And nor did the Italian judicial system, as those scientists were accused and convicted for being superficial and irresponsible in giving their reassuring technical opinion. From that story we should learn an important lesson on communication difficulties.

I don't think that we are poor communicators because science has become more complicated. I think is hard to communicate scientific knowledge because our lack of empathy. Let me put this in a simpler way: When we explain science, we should adapt our explanation to the audience level, by describing complicated phenomena in simple terms as a first approach. On the contrary, we explain science in terms that WE ONLY understand, thereby forcing our audience to adapt to us...

The point is sometimes we are unable to make things more clearer than they really are. Several years ago, a good professor told me this: "At the end of your explanation, the question that you need to make is 'is that Clear?', instead of 'do you understand?'"

Just an opinion...

Which is easier for a scientist? Teaching to a primary school student or a Ph.D student

Why do scientists communicate with each other very well?

In my opinion, scientists dealing with public communities are stronger than others. Perhaps, they spend most of their times in the academic environment and have less interaction with public people, which is thought to be weaker.

Other points (as mentioned in the previous comments):

Different empathy capability among scientists

Different languages between these groups

Little information of public about the many specialized subjects

...

It isn't that research has become complicated; it is because there are too many out there who want to attack science when it doesn't produce the results they want, so scientists and researchers over time have become defensive and paranoid and feel this need to divulge too much information. I have seen engineers at public forums take a 30 second answer and drag it out to 30 minutes by throwing in information that really didn't pertain to the question asked, just in case. I had a colleague who, at a public forum, droned on for several minutes when asked a question and was finally stopped by the questioner, who asked, "Are you able to answer a simple 'yes' or 'no'"? My colleague then spent several minutes trying to answer this question.

There are two main problems with these "preemptive strikes". First, the public has no frame of reference of what we are talking about and often assumes we are just "making stuff up." Second, we sometimes reveal too much information, which in turn causes often unintended negative consequences. I know of a traffic engineer when asked why the streets weren't being striped, went into great detail about how he had bought a $250,000 striper but had no crew to use it, which sparked outrage over wasteful spending.

It has nothing to do with the ability of researchers to explain. Researchers speak the truth. People do not like the truth. They like soft words to feel tenderness in their ears like the politicians do. This is why people like politicians.

As a corollary to Theodore's comment, there are some in the profession who know that people don't want to hear the truth who will pander to the people. Eventually, the truth comes out, and the panderer is discredited. Pandering affects us all, as discredited research and science breeds skepticism of all science in the eyes of the public.

I would say that the general public are not interested in technical jargon and mambo jumbo which indeed are more exciting to scientists. So, there is the paradox. General public wants the ultimate final result of things in a tangible manner, while scientists like to ponder the details, and details of the details.

Mahmud, it is a good point that scientists are more interested in the details than are the general public. Surely, this is one of the things that defines what a scientist is and the difference between funded scientists and the general public. People seem to forget that being a funded scientist is just a job, we get paid to focus our attention on the specifics of science. If members of the public went into such detail in their acquisition of scientific knowledge they may find they had accidentally become an unpaid scientist.

Of course, may people do science in their spare time but they are forced to pick and choose what science they can fit into their lives. This is why scientists, whilst incredibly knowledgeable about a very narrow field of research, often also make do with the ultimate final result of things in sciences outside of their specialty. I would love to know the ins-and-outs of what is reducing bee populations, unfortunately I have a physics deadline to meet so I will add it to the pile of stuff I one day hope to get around to and just have to trust that the bees are in fact disappearing and get on with life.

Science is the creation of knowledge. In our daily lives, we are more concerned with the application of knowledge. There is a fuzzy layer in between knowledge creation and application that is often filled by mostly well-meaning people who misapply knowledge and therefore create confusion. (Unfortunately, some of this is done intentionally to manipulate others.) My thoughts focus on two things in this discussion: the “Scientist” vs. Science and the pain of change.

The “Scientist” vs. Science:

Scientists are not apart from the human race and are therefore part of the problem. Calling someone a "Scientist" doesn't grant them special powers or virtues. Science is not what someone is rather it is what someone does to gain knowledge. We should not accept a person's conclusions just because they are called a scientist but should base our acceptance on the quality of each individual body of work. The “public” – and this includes all scientists – seeks to invest their trust in people, not reports. Until we understand the folly of the “expert opinion” we will continue to make the same mistakes we have always made. Public trust in professions and institutions is reduced with every example of misinformation or malpractice cited in the media and this issue really goes well beyond the field of science. If you want to be trusted, start by being trustworthy.

The Pain of Change:

The universe is simple. The complexity lies in our attempts to understand it. As science uncovers the true nature of the universe it alters our perception of the world around us, writing new rules and tearing up old ones. It shouldn't surprise anyone that this can be a very disturbing process for many including the scientists. One shouldn’t expect to be well-liked if their work has consequences that disturb or even harm others. There is a management method known as Appreciative Inquiry championed by David Cooperider at Case Western Reserve University (http://appreciativeinquiry.case.edu/). The premise for this method is examining the benefits of knowledge gained in any human activity. By this examination, positive change can be extracted from any circumstance. Perhaps there is a lesson for scientists in this process that could help the public accept new perspectives revealed by the scientific process.

I don’t believe there is a single solution to this dilemma, however, the answer may be in the direction of better understanding for everyone -- the creators of knowledge should understand the limits of their work and communicate them effectively along with the knowledge they create; the consumers of knowledge should understand the nature of science and take responsibility for drawing their own conclusions; those who apply knowledge in the form of engineered solutions should also recognize the need to educate/inform others regarding their inventions.

The scientists are not poor communicators. Usually, the general public is not trained to understand the knowledge of the science. That's why is necessary to adjust the demand and the supply by means of a spokesman who can translate/amplify the scientific ideas for the common ears.

I think what is really difficult, is the ability to talk with different cultures by different ways to deliver a same message. This needs experience and maturity.

Indeed...I have attended a meeting with 14 Nobel prices and I was surprised by their abilities to speak and entertain the public.

Here the event

http://www.gyss-one-north.sg/

which was covered during the whole week.