{"id":42,"date":"2015-10-02T10:29:26","date_gmt":"2015-10-02T10:29:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/uwescicomm.wordpress.com\/?p=42"},"modified":"2015-10-02T10:29:26","modified_gmt":"2015-10-02T10:29:26","slug":"knowledge-is-power","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/knowledge-is-power\/","title":{"rendered":"Knowledge is power?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Research shows that audiences at a health science festival prefer lectures.
\n<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

We all know the debates about deficit versus dialogue, but what do audiences prefer? This was the central research question in my recent study<\/a> looking at a health science festival in New Zealand.<\/p>\n

Science festivals offer an interesting environment to explore preferences for format design, as they usually feature a huge variety of different event styles. The science festival in question was held in Auckland, New Zealand, and focussed on health science research around the brain and psychology. Held as part of international Brain Awareness Week, \u2018Brain Day\u2019 attracts over 3000 people to this free one-day annual event- not an insignificant number in a country of just 4.5 million people!<\/p>\n

The festival formats under question were lectures, discussions, a community expo, laboratory experiments and a general good day out. Festival entrants were handed a questionnaire to fill in, and could return it anonymously to a drop-box at the exits, with a prize draw incentive. The experiment was repeated over three years, and in total we reached a sample of 661 people.<\/p>\n

So which format did they prefer? Overwhelmingly, this sample significantly preferred lectures; with 76% ranking them the main attraction, 89% attending them, and 84% stating lectures were the most useful. This was irrespective of age, gender, education, or the year the festival was run. In open response questions participants described their reasons \u2013 stating that \u2018knowledge is power\u2019. Participants were attending the festival to learn something new, and lectures presented a good way to hear about research and expert opinion.<\/p>\n

But wait \u2013 don\u2019t throw the baby out with the bathwater! We conclude that all formats have a part to play in the science communication landscape. Over two-thirds of the sample visited more than one format, and indeed, laboratory experiments were the second choice for family visitors. Yet however you look at it, the much derided format of lectures is still clearly popular with audiences.<\/p>\n

Laura Fogg-Rogers<\/a> is a Research Fellow in the SCU at UWE.<\/em>
\n@laurafoggrogers<\/p>\n

This post was originally published in the STEM Communicators Network newsletter<\/a> Issue 32.The research article it is based on is available in Science Communication 37 (4).<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Research shows that audiences at a health science festival prefer lectures. We all know the debates about deficit versus dialogue, but what do audiences prefer? This was the central research question in my recent study looking at a health science festival in New Zealand. Science festivals offer an interesting environment to explore preferences for format … Continue reading “Knowledge is power?”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wds_primary_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,16,3,4],"tags":[110,149,5,6],"class_list":["post-42","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-health-wellbeing","category-research-projects","category-science-communication","category-science-communication-unit","tag-laura-fogg-rogers","tag-science-festivals","tag-scu","tag-uwe-bristol"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}