{"id":207520,"date":"2015-09-15T15:26:56","date_gmt":"2015-09-15T18:26:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/?p=207520"},"modified":"2016-01-21T12:49:04","modified_gmt":"2016-01-21T14:49:04","slug":"relative-peace","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/relative-peace\/","title":{"rendered":"Relative peace"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Jornalismo_Scan1028\"Negreiros<\/span>Second in a series of articles on science journalism to be published in commemoration of the 20th anniversary of the premier issue of the bulletin Not\u00edcias FAPESP, which later became this magazine, for the purpose of discussing the sometimes difficult relationship between scientists and journalists.\u00a0 The first article, published in the August issue<\/a>, profiled the work of pioneers J\u00falio Abramczyk and Jos\u00e9 Hamilton Ribeiro.<\/em><\/p>\n

In 2008, Ana L\u00facia Azevedo, then science editor of O Globo <\/em>newspaper, was tasked with quickly pulling together an article to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the Portuguese royal family\u2019s arrival in Rio de Janeiro.\u00a0 The historian she called to set up an interview about the subject agreed with her plan for the article and then told her, \u201cCome in two months.\u201d<\/p>\n

She had hoped to schedule the interview for that day or the next.\u00a0 Faced with that impossibility, she located another expert, who was able to see her immediately.\u00a0 Academic researchers have gradually come to recognize the importance of communicating with a wider audience, but there are still some differences with regard to timing and expectations in the relationship between scientists and journalists.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt used to be a lot harder than it is now,\u201d says Azevedo, a 22-year veteran science editor and, since May 2015, special reporter on scientific, environmental and medical topics.\u00a0 \u201cBefore, researchers just did not want to talk.\u00a0 Today, they\u2019re much more receptive, especially the younger ones.\u201d\u00a0 Only once did a young researcher impose a series of conditions to be agreed upon before giving an interview:\u00a0 the journalist refused to accept them and appealed to the researcher\u2019s supervisor, \u201can extremely polite Englishman, and the article came out very well,\u201d she recalls.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere has been a marked improvement in the last 10 years in terms of the media\u2019s attitude with regard to science,\u201d notes physicist\u00a0 Paulo Artaxo, a professor at the Physics Institute of the University of S\u00e3o Paulo (USP).\u00a0 \u201cIn general, reporters today seem better prepared to formulate more intelligent questions.\u00a0 Before, questions were very basic, like \u2018Is it true that the planet is getting warmer?\u2019.\u00a0 Today they ask \u2018How do you assess Brazil\u2019s strategies for combating the impacts of climate change?\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

Artaxo has extensive experience and a rare ability for speaking with journalists.\u00a0 His cordiality and warmth, however, have not entirely prevented mishaps.\u00a0 Several times, he received reporters who had just gotten assigned to interview a climate change expert.\u00a0 \u201cThey asked me: \u2018Professor, what do I need to ask you,\u2019? \u00a0he says.\u00a0 \u201cThat\u2019s when the interview becomes a fiasco.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Jornalismo_Scan1029\"Negreiros<\/span>Another issue arises when an interview starts out well, but then reveals an implicit political shift towards an approach he disagrees with and about which he would never voluntarily make a statement.\u00a0 \u201cI no longer give interviews to some print media because I know that what will come out is what the editor wants and not what I really said,\u201d he has decided, after seeing that requests for corrections were unwelcome.\u00a0 He once called a magazine reporter and said that what had been published was not exactly what he had said.\u00a0 \u201cAnd the reported told me, \u2018that\u2019s how I understood it\u2019,\u201d Artaxo says.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe person who composes the title is not the one who writes the article,\u201d says Esper Cavalheiro, a professor at the Federal University of S\u00e3o Paulo (Unifesp). He acknowledges that journalists today are better prepared and already know more about how science works, although he has also had his share of disappointments.\u00a0 Several years ago, he gave an interview when he began using a convulsant compound to induce epilepsy in laboratory animals.\u00a0 \u201cAnd the title of the piece ended up being something like: \u2018Study looks for anticonvulsant drugs,\u201d he recalls.<\/p>\n

Other conflicts have arisen out of careless use of language or the problem of finding a common language.\u00a0 Cavalheiro makes a point to always say \u201cindividual with epilepsy\u201d yet\u00a0 newspapers always have him using the word \u201cepileptic\u201d or \u201ccarrier of epilepsy,\u201d terms that he abhors.\u00a0 \u201cAnd then my patients come to me and ask, \u2018Did you change your mind?\u2019\u00a0 I would never say that.\u00a0 We have to be careful about the words the public is going to read.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tensions between journalists and scientists \u2013 while much lower these days due to more mature relations, concessions granted by both sides and mutual understanding \u2013 will likely always exist because the two groups work by different rules and at different rhythms, notes Alicia Ivanissevich, executive editor of Ci\u00eancia Hoje<\/em>, a hybrid scientific journal that contains reports and news submitted by journalists as well as articles written by researchers.\u00a0 \u201cIt\u2019s a positive tension that forces us to do our own research, to simplify without being simplistic, and to try to put ourselves in the readers\u2019 shoes.\u201d<\/p>\n

As editor of Ci\u00eancia Hoje <\/em>for the past 18 years, she along with the science editors, receives and reviews articles by scientists for possible publication.\u00a0 \u201cThe articles often contain a huge number of errors, in subjects the scientists should be experts in.\u00a0 There are errors in content, interpretation of graphs, scientific names, methodology; all kinds of things,\u201d she says.\u00a0 \u201cSometimes I wonder if the error was passed on to the journalist because the scientist was lazy or simply too sure of himself. Just as there are good and bad journalists, there are good and bad scientists.\u201d\u00a0 Careful handling of the text during the process of revision is what ensures article quality.\u00a0 \u201cMost scientists recognize the positive involvement on the part of journalists,\u201d she says.\u00a0 \u201cCurrently, 90% of authors express their appreciation for the edits and the coverage.\u201d<\/p>\n

Three researchers from the Netherland\u2019s University of Twente interviewed 21 biomedical scientists and 14 science journalists to analyze the advantages, disadvantages and difficulties involved in communicating with a broader audience than that in academia.\u00a0 According to the May 2015 study published in the Journal of Science Communication<\/em>, scientists in the Netherlands believe that interactions with journalists can help increase visibility, academic prestige and the possibility of recruiting new collaborators, obtaining funding for their research studies and attracting attention to their field of study.\u00a0 On the other hand, if an article is bad, it can damage a scientist\u2019s credibility and academic status, not to mention attract negative criticism from peers.<\/p>\n

Scientists consider it a duty to communicate their scientific research, especially when it is financed through public funds, but say that coverage of science is superficial, incomplete and tends to be sensationalistic.\u00a0 To them, journalists need to know more about the subjects they write about and have more solid academic training.\u00a0 In addition, media professionals often do not clearly present their intentions and are perceived as being arrogant, demanding and inflexible, although there are many differences among journalists and the publications for which they work.<\/p>\n

Journalists, in turn, said that they generally enjoy talking to\u00a0 scientists even though the latter lack the ability to communicate what they do in simple language.\u00a0 Furthermore, journalists said that they had trouble finding other researchers to interview, which would explain the low level of diversity in terms of interviewees, aggravated by tight article production deadlines.\u00a0 \u201cBoth journalists and scientists now understand each other\u2019s roles better,\u201d said Anne Dijkstra, first author of the study, to Pesquisa FAPESP<\/em>.\u00a0 She added that, when necessary, journalists should publicize controversial findings or discoveries, even if it means foregoing their friendly relations with the scientists.<\/p>\n

Journalist Fabiane Cavalcanti came to the same conclusion after listening to 10 scientists and seven journalists from Recife as part of a 1993 study at the Federal University of Pernambuco.\u00a0 According to the study, scientists fear that journalists\u2019 objectivity and desire for immediacy causes them to overly simplify their work, while reporters complain that scientists are stubborn and refuse to provide information. Unifesp\u2019s Cavalheiro is uncomfortable with the journalistic philosophy that deifies scientists who do apparently extraordinary things but then casts them aside if they commit any error.\u00a0 Artaxo has also noted that journalists have trouble handling scientific uncertainty: \u201cScience is not 100% exact.\u201d<\/p>\n

A more thorough understanding by journalists of the processes involved in producing scientific knowledge and \u2013 something extremely rare at Brazilian universities \u2013 training scientists to speak to the press would certainly lead to more satisfactory articles.\u00a0 Biologist Guilherme Becker discovered how just a little preparation before speaking to reporters could be useful.\u00a0 In 2007, he gave several interviews about the decline of amphibian populations in the Atlantic Forest, the subject of his master\u2019s thesis at the University of\u00a0\u00a0 Campinas (Unicamp).\u00a0 Since he did not have much practice in presenting his ideas to a non-academic audience, he did not like some of the reports that were published and thought that his interviewers were also disappointed in the results. \u00a0It was different in 2014 when he spoke with confidence to journalists from the U.S. and Brazil about his doctoral work at Cornell University (see Pesquisa FAPESP <\/em>Issue n\u00ba 226<\/a>).<\/p>\n

What made him so successful the second time was a conversation he had with his advisor, Kelly Zamudio, who had introduced him to media box, a tactic she learned in a professional development course for professors that she took at Cornell.\u00a0 Also called press box, media box is a script that contains the main points of the study to be presented, which helps organize one\u2019s thoughts and maintain the focus of the conversation.\u00a0 The main idea, which would hopefully become the article title of the report, should appear in a box in the center of a sheet of paper.\u00a0 Above it, below it and alongside it, should be additional comments, by topic, that the researcher adds about the methodology or implications of the study, in brief, clear and simple sentences.\u00a0 To reduce the risk of saying something that might be misinterpreted, Becker advises, \u201cdon\u2019t provide a lot of details or talk too long.\u201d<\/p>\n

Refinements to the media box strategy include connectors, which are topics that the journalists may raise \u2013 since they now have a better understanding of the science \u2013, and that the interviewee should avoid, returning quickly to the main or complementary ideas.\u00a0 \u201cKelly told me that even President Obama uses media box, imagining possible comments in order to avoid falling into traps,\u201d Becker says.\u00a0 \u201cMedia training is commonplace in the Netherlands,\u201d says Anne Dijkstra. \u201cAt my university, public relations people train the researchers who will be in contact with media.\u201d<\/p>\n

Scientific articles<\/em>
\nCAVALCANTI, F. G. Jornalistas e cientistas: os entraves de um di\u00e1logo<\/a>. Intercom.<\/strong> V. 18, No. 1, p. 140-152. 1995.
\nDIJKSTRA, A. M. et al<\/em>. The science-media interaction in biomedical research in the Netherlands. Opinions of scientists and journalists on the science-media relationship<\/a>. Journal of Science Communication<\/strong>. V. 14, No. 2, A03, p. 1-21. 2015.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Relationship between scientists and journalists has improved","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[165],"tags":[220,241],"coauthors":[5968],"class_list":["post-207520","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-humanities","tag-communication","tag-history"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207520","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=207520"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207520\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=207520"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=207520"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=207520"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=207520"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}