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Communicating your research can feel like a new discovery. Many of the researchers we meet have found that their passion to engage and to discuss their subject matter has emerged as a mainly solo pursuit, perhaps inspired by a passionate colleague, favourite television programme or an exhibition visit that occurred by chance along the way. This can leave many researchers unaware that the communication of research to others and their engagement with it has been a long-standing issue within research professions. The history of communicating research is
The word ‘impact’ is a real buzz word in academic fields, to the extent that we questioned whether it was risky to title a chapter ‘impact’. The danger with popular terminology is that as swiftly as it comes into fashion, so too can it be disowned, but it is important to recognise that many of the issues bound up in ‘impact’ are not new to research communication. What does impact mean? If we start simply, the Oxford English Dictionary defines impact as ‘the effective action of one thing or person upon another; the effect of such action; influence
Academics may be used to communicating their research findings to their peers, but when they become practitioners of communication and engagement they may not consider the need to communicate the success (or otherwise) of new or novel approaches to communication. Likewise, the practitioner community does not have the same drivers (publications are not metrics by which they are judged) to communicate findings from project evaluations or to synthesise best practice guidelines. As a result, the communication and engagement community are often criticised for
This chapter will focus on ethics from a broad perspective, considering two main approaches. Firstly, the chapter will consider ethics from a communication and engagement standpoint, how to engage with participants ethically, incorporate informed consent procedures, consider any data that are collected, used and stored, give participants access to further information and follow any relevant ethical guidelines. Secondly, the chapter will explore wider questions regarding the ethics of communication and participation. Is communication about research just
A crucial stage in any science communication activity is consideration of the groups with whom you will be communicating. The potential audiences for research communication are many and varied, including those with personal and professional interests. It is important to remember that people can have varying levels of interaction, from an audience member who is happy to come along and contribute quite passively, to a very active contributor who might be involved in shaping the direction of a research project as a whole. We will consider the variety of
Chapter 8: Introduction to Qualitative Data Analysis Helen Brooks, Penny Bee and Anne Rogers Chapter overview Qualitative data includes a range of textual (e.g. transcripts of interviews and focus groups) and visual (photographic and video) data. During qualitative analysis researchers make sense of this data gathered from research. Analysing the data by looking for common themes (known as thematic analysis) is one of the most common ways in which to do this and involves examining and recording patterns within the data relating to a specific research question
In research communication there is a common rallying call encouraging academics to move out of the ivory tower. This concept revolves around the principle that ivory symbolises an impractical and privileged building material, whilst a tower implies a sense of physical, practical and linguistic isolation. The concept was first used in its modern sense to describe the academic community in the nineteenth century, to gently chastise academics on the basis not only of their communication but also of their perceived connectedness with the real world. Thus
Despite C.P. Snow’s framing of the arts and science as two cultures with little common ground, art, science and technology have long been bedfellows (Snow, 1993 ). Advances in science and technology have stimulated developments in the arts as well as acting as inspiration for cultural activities, and visual techniques from the arts have been used to inform and facilitate research across a broad range of disciplines. From Brunelleschi’s early work on perspective, through to the modern day, examples of cross ‘cultural’ impact abound, with artists exploring
A Research Handbook for Patient and Public Involvement Researchers Chapter 2: Introduction to systematic reviews Kelly Rushton and Owen Price Chapter overview Health professionals must make sure that the treatments they provide are safe and have been proven to work. This means they must be able to access and understand all the available research relating to treatments that they use. There can be hundreds of research studies conducted on each treatment, so it is often not practical for busy health professionals to gather all of the evidence themselves. Deciding
Web 2.0 technologies open up many new opportunities to engage publics at all stages of the research process, from design, through data collection and processing, to dissemination, and in a variety of different ways. These can range from fairly passive approaches that provide content for those seeking information (e.g. via project web pages) to highly interactive approaches, such as games and apps. These projects are enabled by a growth in technology, both hardware and software, that enables interaction and engagement and makes it easier for individuals to