I was driving to work yesterday, listening to “Talk of the Nation” on NPR and intrigued to hear scientist Randy Olson talk about his new book “Don’t be such a scientist.” He’s a marine biologist who turned Hollywood consultant so he learned something about the translation necessary to move from the conference room to the board room and the living room. The book outlines the way that sometimes science is presented so dryly and flatly that people are turned off or alienated. He thinks that scientists need to spend as much time learning about how to communicate their research as they spend learning how to do it.
It was an interesting hour, especially as I thought specifically about my role with the beavers. In every way it has been important to make beaver facts accessible and digestible, whether I’m talking to children, adults or researchers. Cheryl’s inviting photos have helped make them easy to understand, and sometimes I’m able to make a lingual shortcut that resonates and can be remembered (Any city smarter than a beaver can keep a beaver). Using human language to describe complex beaver behavior (Beavers using the old lodge as a “picnic table”; Yearlings sleeping in a “Frat house”; The unknown location of last year’s beavers “They don’t write, they don’t call!”) makes it less foreign and easier to understand. It also startles people with the similarities between beavers and humans, which reminds them that we’re all in this together.
I will say that I’ve learned more about reading my audience from beaver advocacy than I ever learned in grad school. Use language that includes rather than excludes. Sometimes you can tell you’re making the talk “too accessible” and people are getting the feeling they’re at a Disney event…then its time to sprinkle terms like “varietal feeding” and “Co-evolved”, but that is rare. Sometimes you can tell that you are miles away from making your point, and its time to start paddling harder. What does the listener care about? Water quality? Cute fuzzy things? Salmon and steelhead? Annoying the city? Find what motivates them and use it as a funnel to pour information through.
Having given “The beaver talk” to literally thousands of people at the dam and at the Farmer’s market, and the more formal version at multiple sights to both adults and kids, (and nearly 700 times on this very website)I think I have learned something about blending science and accessibility. There were things about Randy’s radio talk that rankled and that I would have argued with, but I completely agree that a huge part of making science useful is making sense of it to the people who will use it, pay for it, or benefit from it. (Remember that if you discover whats making trees fall in the forest but no one hears it, it doesn’t make a “sound”.)
Scientists need to get better at talking to us. Don’t get me started on how scientists talk and listen to each other. That’s another book entirely.
