Public communication by research institutes compared across countries and sciences: Building capacity for engagement or competing for visibility?

Instituto Universitário de Lisboa. Lisbon, Portugal / London School of Economics and Political Science. Department of Psychological and Behavioural Science. London, England, United Kingdom.
London School of Economics and Political Science. Department of Psychological and Behavioural Science. London, England, United Kingdom.
University of Chicago. Harris School of Public Policy. Chicago, Illinois, United States of America.
Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf. Department of Social Sciences. Düsseldorf, Germany.
National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies. Tokyo, Japan.
Observa Science & Society. Vicenza, Italy.
Michigan State University. Department of Advertising and Public Relations. East Lansing, Michigan, United States of America.
Fundação Oswaldo Cruz. Casa de Oswaldo Cruz, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil / Instituto Nacional de Comunicação Pública da Ciência e Tecnologia, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil.
Leiden University. Department of Science Communication & Society. Leiden, The Netherlands.
University of Texas at Austin. Stan Richards School of Advertising and Public Relations. Austin, Texas, United States of America.
Università di Trento. Department of Sociology. Trento, Italy.
Fundação Oswaldo Cruz. Casa de Oswaldo Cruz, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil / Instituto Nacional de Comunicação Pública da Ciência e Tecnologia, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil.
Shiga University. Faculty of Education. Otsu Shiga, Japan.
Fundação Oswaldo Cruz. Casa de Oswaldo Cruz, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil / Instituto Nacional de Comunicação Pública da Ciência e Tecnologia, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil.
University of Bologna. Department of Political and Social Sciences. Bologna, Italy.
Bilgi University. Istanbul, Turkey.
Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf. Department of Social Sciences. Düsseldorf, Germany.
National Sun Yat-sen University. Kaohsiung, Taiwan.

Abstract

Leading academic institutions, governments, and funders of research across the world have spent the last few decades fretting publicly about the need for scientists and research organisations to engage more widely with the public and be open about their research. While a global literature asserts that public communication has changed from a virtue to a duty for scientists in many countries and disciplines, our knowledge about what research institutions are doing and what factors drive their ‘going public’ is very limited. Here we present the first cross-national study of N = 2,030 research institutes within universities and large scientific organisations in Brazil, Germany, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Portugal, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America. We find that institutes embrace communication with non-peers and do so through a variety of public events and traditional news media–less so through new media channels–and we find variation across countries and sciences, yet these are less evident than we expected. Country and disciplinary cultures contribute to the level of this communication, as do the resources that institutes make available for the effort; institutes with professionalised staff show higher activity online. Future research should examine whether a real change in the organisational culture is happening or whether this activity and resource allocation is merely a means to increase institutional visibility.

Citation

ENTRADAS, Marta; BAUER, Martin W.; O'MUIRCHEARTAIGH, Colm; MARCINKOWSKI, Frank; OKAMURA, Asako; PELLEGRINI, Giuseppe; BESLEY, John; MASSARANI, Luisa Medeiros; RUSSO, Pedro; DUDO, Anthony; SARACINO, Barbara; SILVA, Carla; KANO, Kei; AMORIM, Luís Henrique de; BUCCHI, Massimiano; SUERDEM, Ahmet; OYAMA, Tatsuo; LI, Yuh-Yuh. Public communication by research institutes compared across countries and sciences: Building capacity for engagement or competing for visibility? PLoS ONE, San Francisco, CA, v. 15, n. 17, e0235191, 2020.

DOI

10.1371/journal.pone.0235191

Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://www.arca.fiocruz.br/handle/icict/43868

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