Moderator
Dr. Jim Woodgett (Director of Research, Lunenfeld-Tanenbaum Research Institute)
Panellist
Amanda Ferguson (Public Relations Manager, Sinai Health Foundation)
Kelly Grant (National Health Reporter, The Globe and Mail)
Anthony Morgan (Founder, Science Everywhere).
Science is often a hard sell to a general audience, and it is a tough act in picking the right stories for the right medium that best highlights excitement without sensationalizing its impact. Friday afternoon convened a panel of journalists and content generators from print to screen to discuss what makes a science story engaging, while maintaining credibility in the craft.
Research, particularly in more basic and fundamental fields, can get nitty-gritty in molecules and equations that breakthrough work can be inaccessible to the public. Amanda Ferguson, whose role with the Sinai Health Foundation involves connecting scientists and their research to the media, firmly believes that there is a home for every story – be it internal write-ups for the institute or print and television for the masses. Timing is incredibly important as well; Ms. Ferguson recalled saving up research pieces for Heart Month in March, but the news of hockey player Jay Bouwmeester having a cardiac episode during a game brought these stories into public consciousness a few weeks early as she worked to bring the right researchers into the limelight to share their expertise on heart health. As a former journalist, Ms. Ferguson knows when a story is “slam-dunk” for print, while others for television can be strengthened by impressive visuals and a human element, such as a patient feature.
Knowing your audience is crucial when deciding which stories to feature. Kelly Grant noted that since the Globe and Mail is a public interest newspaper, stories that are more clinically relevant get chosen. While studies in mice can be exciting and important, they can be misinterpreted for their clinical value in treating disease and better reported in more niche publications. Anthony Morgan’s work is a little flashier; through his work as a television presenter and now bringing science to public spaces with his company Science Everywhere, Mr. Morgan aims to create wonder in his audiences. His goal is to attract the uninterested to the big tent of science, but acknowledges that there is a careful balance in ensuring that science is not sensationalized and the public is not left with “a sense of truth that isn’t”.
Building and maintaining credibility in reporting is often tricky. Mr. Morgan recalled a time while working for VICE when a story that he presented did not have sufficient scientific rigour because, despite having control over the science behind the piece, editing was unfortunately out of his hands. Ms. Grant also lamented that often time and resources are limited and as much as they try to fully flush out stories, details can still fall through the cracks. In the end, Ms. Ferguson assigned the impact and credibility of scientific pieces equally to three parties: the reader, the journalist, and the scientist.