As the COVID-19 pandemic has shown, the clear delivery of research findings to the public can be a matter of literal life or death. This is especially true for psychological science, which can offer a wealth of knowledge about crucial topics ranging from social inequities to the implementation of public health measures.
But writing for the general public isn’t the same as academic writing—and it’s not something that most psychologists train for. Fortunately, it’s a skill that many psychologists are well-positioned to learn. If your job involves teaching, communicating with clients, or putting yourself in others’ shoes, you’re probably halfway there.
“I really, really want to encourage psychologists to write for a broad audience,” says Lisa Damour, PhD, a clinical psychologist who writes a column on adolescence for The New York Times and cohosts a parenting podcast called Ask Lisa. “It’s a public service.”
Despite numerous political controversies, the public’s confidence in science and scientists remains high. The Pew Research Centeropens in new window found that as of 2019, 86% of Americans said they had a great deal or fair amount of confidence that scientists act in the public interest, up from 83% in 2016. That’s higher than Americans’ confidence in public school principals and significantly exceeds people’s confidence in elected officials, which were at 77% and 35%, respectively, in 2019. What that means is there is a lot of demand for writing directly from scientists and those who use scientific research in their careers. Damour and other science writers shared these tips for science communicators.
Know your audience
The first step in communicating science is knowing who you’re addressing. At the Alan Alda Center for Communicating Science at Stony Brook University in New York, instructors ask students to think about what they want their audience to feel, think, or do. This becomes a mission statement to guide everything they write. “We do a lot of exercises that are audience-specific, so you might adapt one piece of writing for three different audiences,” says Ken Weitzman, a playwright and instructor at the Alda Center.
For example, a scientific audience might be most interested in the methodological advances made by a new research paper, says Erika Check Hayden, the director of the Science Communication Program at the University of California, Santa Cruz. A general audience isn’t as likely to find methodology as gripping on its own, so you need to find an angle that applies to people’s lives. “What is the human dimension of the research or the study or the concept that you’re trying to communicate?” Hayden says.
Lead with the takeaway
Perhaps the most dramatic difference between academic writing and popular writing is format. A scientific paper is like an inverted triangle: It starts broadly with the background of the research, covers details and methods, and finally reaches the takeaway message in the conclusion. Writing for a popular audience flips that formula upside down. “They want to know your findings first and then how and why that’s important,” says Hayden. Only after getting the key takeaway messages up top can you delve into background and other details of the research. You’ll want to be able to craft your main point to ensure it captures the attention of the audience that needs to hear it most.
Nix jargon and embrace metaphors
Precision in academic writing often requires repetition: If you’re writing about major depressive disorder, you’ll use that terminology consistently. In popular writing, though, you may need to pull out the thesaurus to vary your vocabulary, Damour says. A little linguistic flexibility translates to better readability for general audiences. Similarly, simplify sentences, use active voice, and use metaphors liberally when describing complex concepts. And cut out jargon: Your readers may boggle at the term “type I error,” but they’re likely to immediately grasp “false positive.” Don’t think of this process as “dumbing down” your work, says Michelle Nijhuis, a science journalist and coeditor of The Science Writers’ Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Pitch, Publish, and Prosper in the Digital Ageopens in new window. “The people you’re speaking to aren’t dumb,” Nijhuis says. “They just are interested in different things than you’re interested in.”
Cutting jargon and simplifying sentences also makes it easier to get your message across. “If you’re struggling to parse the sentence that somebody wrote, you can’t also wrap your head around a brand-new concept,” says Art Markman, PhD, a psychologist at the University of Texas at Austin who writes for media outlets such as Fast Company.
Be honest, but don’t over-caveat
Another difference between academic and popular writing is how each handles uncertainty. In academic writing, it’s important to center caveats and limitations of any research study.
This is also important when writing for a general audience, but caveats should be handled with care. General audiences are more likely than scientists to see uncertainty as undermining the main argument. When you introduce uncertainty, include enough context so that your audience understands why your message still matters.
“Don’t go so far with your caveating that you undercut the significance of what you have to say,” Nijhuis says.
Find your outlet
There are a dizzying array of ways to communicate about research, from podcasts to blogs to op-eds. Damour got her start at The New York Times by writing a piece for the Motherlode blog and sending it to the editor cold—but not before poring over previous posts and writing to match the parenting blog’s style. It helps to think of different outlets as different clothing brands, she says. Some are selling fancy coats, others sportswear. “Sometimes where academics struggle is they’re trying to submit an embroidered coat to a place that sells parkas,” she says. “There’s nothing wrong with the embroidered coat, but the outlet that sells parkas doesn’t work with that kind of content.”
Before reaching out to an editor you want to write for, make sure you understand their audience and writing style, Damour says. It’s also useful to understand what kind of content they publish. Most daily news publications will want a timely “hook,” like a new study or ripped-from-the-headlines topic. Others, like The New Yorker, run deep dives that don’t need to be as timely (though you’ll still have to explain why the topic is relevant to readers). Just because someone else has written about a topic doesn’t mean you can’t too, Damour adds. In commercial book publishing in particular, editors like to publish books on topics that are already selling well.
Leverage your network
You don’t have to launch a science-writing sideline in a vacuum. Markman started communicating directly to the public after his frustration with politicians cutting funding for behavioral research boiled over. He worked with his university’s public affairs office to start doing more media work and began writing op-eds. Many professional organizations, such as the American Association for the Advancement of Science, also offer resources for science communication.
Markman also recommends reaching out to colleagues who are already writing for the general public for advice and for inroads into publishing. It’s also worthwhile to interact with journalists, he says. Markman landed a regular writing gig at Entrepreneur magazine because reporters there interviewed him so often that the editor finally reached out to see if he would write for them. Local NPR affiliates are often interested in hearing from professionals in their regions, Markman says. He cohosts a long-running podcast called Two Guys on Your Head on KUT-FM in Austin.
Science communication was once viewed as somewhat suspect in academic circles, Damour says, but that is changing. There is now an active community of scientist-communicators online (often under the hashtag #scicomm on social media) and far broader acceptance that communicating results is part of a researcher’s job. There are also many formal resources, including online workshops and trainings, to teach science communication skills.
“We should be proud of what we know as psychologists, and we should be generous in sharing it, especially now,” Damour says.
