What is Science Communication & Why is it Valuable For Public Relations Professionals?

By Alexandria Anderson Sellers 

When most people think of public relations, science is not the first thing to come to mind. 

Chelsea Ratcliff, Assistant Professor in the Department of Communication Studies at UGA

Personally, when I heard the term science communication, I couldn’t think of any major connections to public relations. However, after hearing from Assistant Professor in the Department of Communication Studies at UGA, Chelsea Ratcliff, the relationship between science communication and public relations was clear.

“Science communication is the communication of evidence between experts, between scientists, or between scientists and the public, or between scientists and journalists, or policy makers, government leaders, decision makers.” Ratcliff explained.

However, sometimes this communication of scientific information is disrupted due to a gap in knowledge or information. 

“Not everyone has the technical knowledge required to understand that material and even if they did, that’s where science communication comes in. Disseminating the research to public audiences and translating it into content that is accessible, understandable to general audiences,” Ratcliff said.

In order to achieve this dissemination of knowledge, science communication utilizes professionals that are skilled in communicating and disseminating information amongst large audiences, such as public relations professionals.

“Having a team trained in science communicators is an effective way to influence policy and these specialists write press releases, derive plain language science summaries [summarized findings in data reports that use language most people can easily understand], develop newsletters, have a web presence and develop tools that can be used within databases.

Apart from professional communicators, Ratcliff emphasized the idea that anyone can be a science communicator. 

“Everybody can be science communicators. [Communciactors] can be scientists or expert healthcare providers with social media followings. It can be journalists and other content creators. It could be citizens on social media,” she explained.

Storytelling, an art that all public relations and communications professionals must utilize in one way or another, has a key role in science communication.

“Sometimes presenting people with a bunch of facts or statistics isn’t particularly effective, at least not on its own…people don’t always know what to do with that information, so they don’t know how it applies to them or real world scenarios. But when we hear a story about a person or group of people, or maybe hear testimonials from someone about how it affected them or their family or their community, it hits us differently,” Ratcliff said.

“Storytelling is going to be a great technique that, in some ways, can converge across specific values or interests. You know, even if I’m younger and I hear a story about grandma and how she’s affected by climate change, I still care,” Ratcliff added.

Chelsea Ratcliff teaches multiple classes at UGA that allow students to better understand the intersection of scientific research and works and communication.

“[In my classes] we focus on communicating science to scientists and other experts…communicating to the public…and communicating science to journalists,” Ratcliff explained.

While her classes are housed under Franklin, the college of arts and sciences, they are open to all majors and anyone interested in science, communication or both are encouraged to sign up.