Public Communication Practices and Beliefs Among Conservation Scientists and Practitioners

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Abstract

Public communication is increasingly recognized as a key component in successful natural resource management within government agencies responsible for conservation. However, communication practices and beliefs among government conservation scientists and practitioners are not well studied or understood. Herein, we present the results of a communication survey disseminated to U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service employees working for the agency's Ecological Services program, a program charged with endangered species recovery. We asked respondents about public communication practices and beliefs, and factors that may motivate or discourage participation in public communication activities. Study respondents reported the lowest levels of participation in media-related, one-way communication activities, including writing educational materials and answering media inquiries. Respondents reported most frequently engaging in one-on-one communication with stakeholders. Although our results suggest that respondents engage in frequent communication with stakeholders, our results also suggest that they mostly communicate with stakeholders remotely, and especially by email, rather than in person. Furthermore, only 36% reported that they go out of their way to visit people in communities. On the other hand, a majority agreed that they learn new things about species and landscapes (80%) from conversations with stakeholders and often use this knowledge to solve conservation problems (89%). With respect to factors that encourage and discourage participation, 93% of respondents indicated that a desire to produce better conservation outcomes motivates them to communicate with stakeholders and the public. Many agreed that a lack of time was an obstacle to participating in public communication (68%), but an even larger majority (86%) indicated that public unfamiliarity with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service presented a barrier to public communication. Similarly, a majority of employees agreed that public and stakeholder unfamiliarity with themselves and their work also presented a communication barrier (62%). Our findings suggest that agencies responsible for conservation may want to assess whether the agency and its employees adequately invest in communication activities that foster public familiarity.

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The lure of rationality: Why does the deficit model persist in science communication?

Sara Yeo, Michael Cacciatore, Haley Madden … (2016)

Science communication has been historically predicated on the knowledge deficit model. Yet, empirical research has shown that public communication of science is more complex than what the knowledge deficit model suggests. In this essay, we pose four lines of reasoning and present empirical data for why we believe the deficit model still persists in public communication of science. First, we posit that scientists' training results in the belief that public audiences can and do process information in a rational manner. Second, the persistence of this model may be a product of current institutional structures. Many graduate education programs in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields generally lack formal training in public communication. We offer empirical evidence that demonstrates that scientists who have less positive attitudes toward the social sciences are more likely to adhere to the knowledge deficit model of science communication. Third, we present empirical evidence of how scientists conceptualize "the public" and link this to attitudes toward the deficit model. We find that perceiving a knowledge deficit in the public is closely tied to scientists' perceptions of the individuals who comprise the public. Finally, we argue that the knowledge deficit model is perpetuated because it can easily influence public policy for science issues. We propose some ways to uproot the deficit model and move toward more effective science communication efforts, which include training scientists in communication methods grounded in social science research and using approaches that engage community members around scientific issues.