Any notion that the 6th World Conference of Science Journalists held in London last week was going to be a tame, cosy affair was shattered at the opening plenary when a row broke out as to what constitutes science journalism. Jeff Nesbit, Director of the office of legislative affairs at the US National Science Foundation, which is a bit like our research councils, offered his prescription for the current crisis in science journalism – the scientific community should step in and do it ourselves. And this was not just a provocative idea – we learned that no sooner had Jeff heard that CNN had closed their entire science unit, than he hired two of them to write and film content for NSF’s websites. When I leapt to my feet to describe what he was doing as ‘science communication’ not ‘science journalism’, Nesbitt fought back with two contentious statements. Firstly he argued that because the two people he hired are journalists with journalistic training that they will still be doing journalism for NSF. And secondly that we no longer have the luxury of this academic debate – science journalism is disappearing before our eyes and the scientific community is obliged to step in and replace it.
For me the issue became the defining theme of the Conference and raised its head in almost every session. Most people spent the week trying to tell me that arrival of new media and the pressures on science journalism around the world mean that the lines between journalism and PR have now been blurred. Press officers tweeting all day and creating video clips for their University websites told me that the term press officer has become a misnomer as they spend as much time creating ‘content’ as helping journalists to create it. And science writers who have moved from national newspapers to write for popular science blogs insisted that they are engaged in the same craft. But just because we are blurring lines doesn’t mean those lines no longer exist. And nor does it mean that we should not pause at this time of change and reflect on whether those lines are important to maintain. One of the delegates challenged Nesbitt to give the money spent hiring the ex CNN reporters to CNN to keep them on. Unrealistic maybe, but a neat way of making the point that we have some choices here. Faced with a crisis in journalism we can look for ways to shore it up and defend it, or we can simply declare it in terminal decline and set about replacing it.
I think one of the reasons Nesbitt’s talk left me bristling is that I’m finding it increasingly hard to find anyone to defend the craft of journalism. Having decided aged 18 to study it and spent my adult life as a journalism junky I find this alarming. Of course I could talk about its flaws forever and listening to Nick Davies again at the conference we were reminded that ‘churnalism’ prevails. But at its best journalism represents a specific approach which is distinct from other forms of communication; it is a process with a common set of standards including selection, investigation, truth telling, independence, editing, accuracy, balance, scrutiny, objectivity and so on.
Yet for some this fine set of mores is so fragile that it has apparently just collapsed in the face of a barrage of new technologies. Mobile phones, blogs and twitter have, we are told, made journalists of us all. I can’t tell you how mad it makes me to hear the people who were caught up in the July 7th bombings or the poor unfortunates vomiting on some cruise ship, or even the brave protestors in Iran described as ‘citizen journalists’. They are nothing of the sort – they are members of the public caught up in a news story as members of the public always have been. Yes their photos, blogs and tweets have radically changed the face of journalism – mostly for the better - but that does not make them journalists. And anyone who noticed how many conflicting reports came from the ‘citizen journalists’ who witnessed the shooting of John Charles de Menzes should note that a journalist is still needed to sift thought these accounts and apply journalistic standards to the mess.
And I have a similar reaction to Jeff Nesbitt’s approach. I don’t buy the ‘once a journalist always a journalist’ line and in fact I take a sneaking pleasure in watching many journalists who have been rude about PR finally come over to the dark side when needs must. Jeff’s ex-journalists will make great employees, they will understand the way the media works and apply the values of journalism to what they do but they are no longer working journalists. As soon as NSF employed them to produce copy for its website they underwent a career change – they can take their pick of job titles – they can be science writers, science communicators or science PR officers but they are not journalists. Of course I don’t actually know the finer details of their contract so maybe I will stand corrected but since there is a lot of this about I am determined to labour my point here. If NSF selects the subjects that they film then that immediately make this a different enterprise. And here’s a thing – what if in the course of their work for NSF they discover a funding scandal or uncover a scientific fraud– will that end up as a film on the website? Maybe I’ll be surprised by the answers but we should at least ask the questions.
I am not in any way posing science journalism as superior to science communication. I am a huge fan of the latter and believe it's imperative for science in general to get round the very journalistic vagaries that I alluded to earlier. Just because journalism is worth defending does not mean it’s always a good thing for science, as we know to our cost after stories like GM and MMR. Finding ways round some of the less attractive norms of journalism – the perverse news values, the dreaded headline writers, the need to ‘balance’ every article – is critical and scientists should use every method at their disposal to get the full story about science direct to the public. But in the same way that ‘citizen journalists’ would never have claimed that title for themselves, none of the science communicators I know see themselves as journalists and while the delegate who described us as ‘cheerleaders’ for science may have gone too far, I think most science press officers and communicators would accept that we are paid to get the best possible profile for the science carried out in our institutions.
Nor am I arguing that some of the new approaches like the one described by Nesbitt will not end up taking the place of traditional journalism. If Nick Davies’ bleak view that the thing we know as ‘journalism’ may be beyond saving is right then we must accept that we need to look at ways of doing something similar which achieves some of the same ends – informing educating and entertaining vast sections of the public about science. Indeed some blogs like RealClimate and PlanetEarth could be said to be doing that already. But that still doesn’t make these things ‘journalism’. It’s perhaps ironic that a week after Davies announced the death of journalism at the World Conference he himself broke one of the biggest stories of the year about the bugging of celebrities phones.
It is precisely because science journalism (as all traditional journalism) is under pressure and in decline that I think we need to fight for it. Instead of standing by passively and allowing lines to be blurred and investing in alternatives, we should consider ways to defend, shore up and champion science journalism – something we did collectively and to good effect at the World Conference.
Monday, 13 July 2009
Tuesday, 17 March 2009
Fiona discusses science and politics on Radio 4's Leading Edge
The Home Secretary publically demanded and received an apology from Professor David Nutt, Chair of the independent Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, for saying what he believes about the relative risks of ecstasy and horse riding. A few days later Professor Adrian Smith, who has recently moved from academia into government, was also forced to apologise to Secretary of State John Denham for saying what he believes, in a speech about the poor quality of science exams. Unlike Nutt, Smith is now a paid up civil servant as the Director General of Science and Research at the Department for Innovation Universities and Skills and as such not free to speak his mind. However, like Nutt, he was appointed to his post because of a long and distinguished career as a mathematician and academic. What they also have in common is that these retractions were not for racist gaffes or plunging the country into financial chaos – they are apologies demanded by government quite simply because what these experts believe conflicts with government policy.
This is a worrying trend and one that anyone interested in evidence based policy should care about. Surely the whole point of appointing leading scientists to advise or join the government is to access their expertise not stifle it. In her very public castigation of David Nutt Jacqui Smith insisted that his comments (published in a peer reviewed academic journal) were incompatible with his role as an adviser to government. But this is crazy – are scientists to stop publishing in their own field because they are chairing one committee advising government?
This is not to argue that government must always follow the advice of its scientific advisers. Politicians rightly base their decisions on many factors and I have no doubt that when rejecting the ACMD’s advice on the grading of cannabis and ecstasy the Home Secretary had to measure the strong views of police chiefs and the public against the recommendations of her own advisers. I have no objection to that – it’s called democracy and we have the option of voting Jacqui out if we don’t like her decisions. However that does not and should not translate into stopping us hearing what these scientists have to say in the first place.
As someone who cares passionately about the quality of public debate on science what worries me most is that society may lose out on the views and expertise of some of the UK’s leading academics on some of the most important issues of our time. Adrian Smith has promised not to repeat his concerns about the state of science education and it’s hard to see how David Nutt can keep hold of his job if he repeats his comments about the relative risks of ecstasy. At his valedictory lecture the wonderful former Chief Scientific Adviser and acclaimed chemist Professor Sir David King reflected on the trouble he got in with ministers after saying in the US that climate change was a bigger threat than terrorism. His message to all the Scientific Advisers brought in to work for government was to think long and hard before making statements publically that might undermine government policy
Ever since Galileo, scientists have been testing established theories and challenging orthodoxies. A grown up, self confident government would have the courage to let our modern day Galileos do just that...from both inside and outside government. And guess what: we might even get more grown up and informed debates!
Broadcast on Leading Edge, BBC Radio 4, Thursday 5 March 2009
This is a worrying trend and one that anyone interested in evidence based policy should care about. Surely the whole point of appointing leading scientists to advise or join the government is to access their expertise not stifle it. In her very public castigation of David Nutt Jacqui Smith insisted that his comments (published in a peer reviewed academic journal) were incompatible with his role as an adviser to government. But this is crazy – are scientists to stop publishing in their own field because they are chairing one committee advising government?
This is not to argue that government must always follow the advice of its scientific advisers. Politicians rightly base their decisions on many factors and I have no doubt that when rejecting the ACMD’s advice on the grading of cannabis and ecstasy the Home Secretary had to measure the strong views of police chiefs and the public against the recommendations of her own advisers. I have no objection to that – it’s called democracy and we have the option of voting Jacqui out if we don’t like her decisions. However that does not and should not translate into stopping us hearing what these scientists have to say in the first place.
As someone who cares passionately about the quality of public debate on science what worries me most is that society may lose out on the views and expertise of some of the UK’s leading academics on some of the most important issues of our time. Adrian Smith has promised not to repeat his concerns about the state of science education and it’s hard to see how David Nutt can keep hold of his job if he repeats his comments about the relative risks of ecstasy. At his valedictory lecture the wonderful former Chief Scientific Adviser and acclaimed chemist Professor Sir David King reflected on the trouble he got in with ministers after saying in the US that climate change was a bigger threat than terrorism. His message to all the Scientific Advisers brought in to work for government was to think long and hard before making statements publically that might undermine government policy
Ever since Galileo, scientists have been testing established theories and challenging orthodoxies. A grown up, self confident government would have the courage to let our modern day Galileos do just that...from both inside and outside government. And guess what: we might even get more grown up and informed debates!
Broadcast on Leading Edge, BBC Radio 4, Thursday 5 March 2009
Friday, 13 February 2009
"Using a sledgehammer to crack a Nutt" - the media furore over ecstasy
It's hard to express just how dismayed I feel at the shameful way in which one of my favourite scientists was treated by the Government this week. Professor David Nutt, Chair of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, was condemned in parliament by the Home Secretary Jacqui Smith for comments in the media in which he argued that taking ecstasy was no more dangerous than riding horses. Slamming the Prof's comments as "trivialising the dangers of drugs" and "showing insensitivity to the families of victims", the Home Secretary informed MPs that she had called the scientist to demand that he apologise publically to her and to the families of victims. As one sketch writer described it: "With shameless self-righteousness, Miss Smith became the wielder of a sledgehammer to crush Professor Nutt."
With the honourable exception of Lib Dem MP Evan Harris who complained to the Speaker about the unprecedented attack on a "distinguished scientist who was unable to answer back in parliament", MPs raced to pile in against David Nutt with Keith Vaz prompting Jacqui Smith's outburst by asking whether she planned to have a word with her adviser and Tory MP Laurence Robertson suggesting that Professor Nutt "might be appropriately named but he's in the wrong job" (no apology yet issued for his rudeness!).
Of course demanding apologies these days is de rigueur – just this week the BBC demanded one from Carol Thatcher for her allegedly racist comments, Jeremy Clarkson for calling the PM a 'one-eyed Scottish idiot' and of course we are drowning in apologies from bankers. But spot the difference here. Professor Nutt was not asked to apologise for an insult overheard or for scientific fraud – he was being told to apologise for saying what he believes to be true based on over thirty years of distinguished scientific research in this field. To be precise this eminent scientist was being told to apologise for something he wrote in an editorial published in the Journal of Psychopharmacology, a respected peer-reviewed journal.
Unlike Thatcher and Clarkson who gave half-hearted apologies, David Nutt did deliver the required apology which was widely reported in the press. But this was an apology that should never have been demanded and I believe it marks a shameful episode in the relationship between Government and their independent scientific advisers.
Let's look at a few facts here. David Nutt was appointed as Chair of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs a few months ago after taking over from the equally wonderful and respected Michael Rawlins. The independent advisory body was set up in 1971 and as reported in the Guardian this week is widely respected for 'injecting some rationality' into drugs policy. The Home Office would have been fully aware of David's stance on ecstasy when they appointed him as Chair because he has presented scientific papers on it, published on it and argued around it for many, many years now. The Home Secretary was quick to declare that the views quoted in the press were incompatible with David's role as Chair of ACMD but the idea that leading researchers should abandon 30 years of their own research when they agree to chair an independent advisory body is ludicrous. David was appointed to this and many other influential advisory bodies because of his expertise, not in spite of it. And anyway, the comments that so angered Jacqui Smith were made in a paper published before he was appointed to chair the ACMD and written in his capacity as a Professor of Psychopharmacology, not as Chair of ACMD.
As Evan Harris MP pointed out: "As a scientist David Nutt would be expected to publish peer reviewed work in the scientific literature. In so doing he can occasionally expect to be criticised publically by the Daily Mail (as happened here) and by ignorant politicians (as happened here). But he would surely not expect to be phoned by the Home Secretary and told to apologise to her and to the families of [victims of] drug deaths. Surely the fact that he is an independent adviser to Government entitles him to more protection, not less, from public criticism from ministers."
While most of the scientists I spoke to felt sorry for David, some felt that speaking out like this the week before the long-awaited ACMD Report on ecstasy was due to recommend the downgrading of the drug was riskier than ecstasy and horse-riding put together (and no – don't try that at home!). I too wondered why David had decided to go public with comments that would obviously grab the headlines just days before he was due to brief the media on the considered and comprehensive recommendations of his committee. So I called him up and guess what – David hadn't gone to anyone with this story. Instead, as is so often the case on controversial issues like this one, the media came to him. On the weekend before the launch of his report David was contacted by journalists from the Daily Telegraph who had suddenly and inexplicably become regular readers of pre-prints of the Journal of Psychopharmacology. The Telegraph got their exclusive which was then picked up throughout the media forcing David into a number of interviews defending his position. This row was not of David Nutt's making or timing – a fact that should have been blatantly obvious to Government ministers and their army of sophisticated spin doctors.
This episode is laced with ironies, but perhaps the most obvious one is that Jacqui Smith accused David Nutt of "making light of a serious problem and trivialising the dangers of drugs". I feel the exact opposite has happened. The Home Secretary was not responding to David Nutt's scientific work on this issue but to the selective and partial reporting of that work in the news timed to stir up the row in advance of the ACMD report. What's that if not trivialising the issue?
David Nutt may well be controversial; you may well reject his work on comparing drug risks with other legal but dangerous activities – many excellent scientists do. But one thing you cannot accuse him of is being trivial or making light of the issue. I was present at press briefings where David Nutt explained his scientific work on harm analysis; he and the eminent scientist and former head of the Medical Research Council Colin Blakemore published a major paper on this approach in the Lancet at the Science Media Centre a couple of years ago, where they presented a complex evidence-based model which they argued could be used to rank illegal drugs in terms of harms and also drew out risk comparisons with some legal but dangerous activities. My point here is not that David Nutt is right, but that his approach is well known to the Home Office, shared and respected by many eminent scientists, and basically anything but 'trivial'.
As Professor Nutt said in an interview with Eddie Mair on PM on Radio 4: "The Government is concerned that downgrading ecstasy would be sending the wrong signal to young people. But I believe that the only correct signal is a signal based on the true scientific evidence. We damage that signal if we say that a drug is more harmful than it actually is."
And there is one other worrying aspect of this whole affair. One of the reasons that I and the Science Media Centre are friendly with David Nutt is that we have hosted the media briefings of the ACMD in the past. But this time we declined to do so on the basis that the Centre's fiercely protected independence was being undermined by the conditions being placed on us by the Home Office press officers about aspects of the press briefings. While the press officers for the ACMD are really nice people who have clearly developed some loyalty to the committee, at the end of the day they are Home Office press officers and the Home Secretary is their boss. For cases like cannabis and ecstasy where the evidence-based advice on classification from the advisors has been firmly rejected by the Government, this is a serious conflict of interest. One of the things that has emerged from this miserable affair is the critical importance of the mass media in these scientific controversies, and the SMC has now asked the IUSS Committee to look into how independent scientific advisers can get access to independent media relations support.
I was initially saddened that David Nutt had been forced to apologise but what became clear in his brilliant interview on PM on the day the report was published is that David Nutt wants to keep his job. Why? Because this scientist passionately believes that the ACMD can reach out beyond the shallow and superficial confines of a manufactured media spat shamefully engaged in by ministers, and generate a more considered, rational public debate on drugs. For that we should all salute him!
With the honourable exception of Lib Dem MP Evan Harris who complained to the Speaker about the unprecedented attack on a "distinguished scientist who was unable to answer back in parliament", MPs raced to pile in against David Nutt with Keith Vaz prompting Jacqui Smith's outburst by asking whether she planned to have a word with her adviser and Tory MP Laurence Robertson suggesting that Professor Nutt "might be appropriately named but he's in the wrong job" (no apology yet issued for his rudeness!).
Of course demanding apologies these days is de rigueur – just this week the BBC demanded one from Carol Thatcher for her allegedly racist comments, Jeremy Clarkson for calling the PM a 'one-eyed Scottish idiot' and of course we are drowning in apologies from bankers. But spot the difference here. Professor Nutt was not asked to apologise for an insult overheard or for scientific fraud – he was being told to apologise for saying what he believes to be true based on over thirty years of distinguished scientific research in this field. To be precise this eminent scientist was being told to apologise for something he wrote in an editorial published in the Journal of Psychopharmacology, a respected peer-reviewed journal.
Unlike Thatcher and Clarkson who gave half-hearted apologies, David Nutt did deliver the required apology which was widely reported in the press. But this was an apology that should never have been demanded and I believe it marks a shameful episode in the relationship between Government and their independent scientific advisers.
Let's look at a few facts here. David Nutt was appointed as Chair of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs a few months ago after taking over from the equally wonderful and respected Michael Rawlins. The independent advisory body was set up in 1971 and as reported in the Guardian this week is widely respected for 'injecting some rationality' into drugs policy. The Home Office would have been fully aware of David's stance on ecstasy when they appointed him as Chair because he has presented scientific papers on it, published on it and argued around it for many, many years now. The Home Secretary was quick to declare that the views quoted in the press were incompatible with David's role as Chair of ACMD but the idea that leading researchers should abandon 30 years of their own research when they agree to chair an independent advisory body is ludicrous. David was appointed to this and many other influential advisory bodies because of his expertise, not in spite of it. And anyway, the comments that so angered Jacqui Smith were made in a paper published before he was appointed to chair the ACMD and written in his capacity as a Professor of Psychopharmacology, not as Chair of ACMD.
As Evan Harris MP pointed out: "As a scientist David Nutt would be expected to publish peer reviewed work in the scientific literature. In so doing he can occasionally expect to be criticised publically by the Daily Mail (as happened here) and by ignorant politicians (as happened here). But he would surely not expect to be phoned by the Home Secretary and told to apologise to her and to the families of [victims of] drug deaths. Surely the fact that he is an independent adviser to Government entitles him to more protection, not less, from public criticism from ministers."
While most of the scientists I spoke to felt sorry for David, some felt that speaking out like this the week before the long-awaited ACMD Report on ecstasy was due to recommend the downgrading of the drug was riskier than ecstasy and horse-riding put together (and no – don't try that at home!). I too wondered why David had decided to go public with comments that would obviously grab the headlines just days before he was due to brief the media on the considered and comprehensive recommendations of his committee. So I called him up and guess what – David hadn't gone to anyone with this story. Instead, as is so often the case on controversial issues like this one, the media came to him. On the weekend before the launch of his report David was contacted by journalists from the Daily Telegraph who had suddenly and inexplicably become regular readers of pre-prints of the Journal of Psychopharmacology. The Telegraph got their exclusive which was then picked up throughout the media forcing David into a number of interviews defending his position. This row was not of David Nutt's making or timing – a fact that should have been blatantly obvious to Government ministers and their army of sophisticated spin doctors.
This episode is laced with ironies, but perhaps the most obvious one is that Jacqui Smith accused David Nutt of "making light of a serious problem and trivialising the dangers of drugs". I feel the exact opposite has happened. The Home Secretary was not responding to David Nutt's scientific work on this issue but to the selective and partial reporting of that work in the news timed to stir up the row in advance of the ACMD report. What's that if not trivialising the issue?
David Nutt may well be controversial; you may well reject his work on comparing drug risks with other legal but dangerous activities – many excellent scientists do. But one thing you cannot accuse him of is being trivial or making light of the issue. I was present at press briefings where David Nutt explained his scientific work on harm analysis; he and the eminent scientist and former head of the Medical Research Council Colin Blakemore published a major paper on this approach in the Lancet at the Science Media Centre a couple of years ago, where they presented a complex evidence-based model which they argued could be used to rank illegal drugs in terms of harms and also drew out risk comparisons with some legal but dangerous activities. My point here is not that David Nutt is right, but that his approach is well known to the Home Office, shared and respected by many eminent scientists, and basically anything but 'trivial'.
As Professor Nutt said in an interview with Eddie Mair on PM on Radio 4: "The Government is concerned that downgrading ecstasy would be sending the wrong signal to young people. But I believe that the only correct signal is a signal based on the true scientific evidence. We damage that signal if we say that a drug is more harmful than it actually is."
And there is one other worrying aspect of this whole affair. One of the reasons that I and the Science Media Centre are friendly with David Nutt is that we have hosted the media briefings of the ACMD in the past. But this time we declined to do so on the basis that the Centre's fiercely protected independence was being undermined by the conditions being placed on us by the Home Office press officers about aspects of the press briefings. While the press officers for the ACMD are really nice people who have clearly developed some loyalty to the committee, at the end of the day they are Home Office press officers and the Home Secretary is their boss. For cases like cannabis and ecstasy where the evidence-based advice on classification from the advisors has been firmly rejected by the Government, this is a serious conflict of interest. One of the things that has emerged from this miserable affair is the critical importance of the mass media in these scientific controversies, and the SMC has now asked the IUSS Committee to look into how independent scientific advisers can get access to independent media relations support.
I was initially saddened that David Nutt had been forced to apologise but what became clear in his brilliant interview on PM on the day the report was published is that David Nutt wants to keep his job. Why? Because this scientist passionately believes that the ACMD can reach out beyond the shallow and superficial confines of a manufactured media spat shamefully engaged in by ministers, and generate a more considered, rational public debate on drugs. For that we should all salute him!
Wednesday, 4 February 2009
Fiona creates a buzz at the World Conference of Science Journalists 2009 Programme Launch Party, London
If the Science Media Centre were to close down tomorrow the most important lesson I would have learned in my six years in science media relations is that science specialist reporters are our greatest ally. Quite simply when science reporters cover science stories, the stories are better. I do believe that science is a special case and needs specialist reporting. And I do believe that bad science reporting costs lives.
It's because I think science reporters are a special case that I think we need a special conference for science journalism. Those of you who know me will know I'm a conference sceptic and tend to think that too many people sit in conferences discussing science communication rather than actually doing it, but that scepticism went out the window when I attended the World Conference of Science Journalists in Melbourne, 2007. Being in the company of 600 science journalists from 50 countries was an amazing experience. I knew this conference was different when I slipped into the first session late to hear contributions from the floor from the editor of Scientific American, the editor of Nature, the science editor of the Toronto Star and head of science at the South African Broadcasting Corporation.
As Chair of the Programme Committee for the World Conference of Science Journalists 2009, I was in despair a year ago because we were sitting looking at a blank page where the programme should be. Now I'm in despair for a different reason, because we have such a wonderful programme that the big dilemma is which sessions I can actually go to and tragically which ones I'll have to miss.
On day one there is Jia Hepeng's session on Reporting science in countries with restraints which clashes with Ehsan Masood's session on Reporting creationism, which in turn clashes with my session with Nick Davies, the author of Flat Earth News and creator of the term 'churnalism'.
Then on Wednesday there is the choice between Tim Radford in conversation with Bob May, or Martin Moore's session on Whether science journalism and science PR have become too close for comfort, and I can't go to either because I'm speaking at a session with my fellow Directors of Science Media Centres in New Zealand, Australia and Canada on How science in the media looks entirely different in different countries.
I am really proud of the programme. Pallab Ghosh, President of the World Federation of Science Journalists, has been on our case the whole time to make it edgy and provocative, and he is not disappointed. Put it like this there are likely to be lots of rows and debates that will spill out into the coffee breaks and parties. This conference will generate a very real debate about very real topical controversies in science journalism.
Now all we need is the audience, so please tell everyone, let’s create even more of a buzz, WCSJ2009 is the place to be for everyone who cares about science journalism!”
It's because I think science reporters are a special case that I think we need a special conference for science journalism. Those of you who know me will know I'm a conference sceptic and tend to think that too many people sit in conferences discussing science communication rather than actually doing it, but that scepticism went out the window when I attended the World Conference of Science Journalists in Melbourne, 2007. Being in the company of 600 science journalists from 50 countries was an amazing experience. I knew this conference was different when I slipped into the first session late to hear contributions from the floor from the editor of Scientific American, the editor of Nature, the science editor of the Toronto Star and head of science at the South African Broadcasting Corporation.
As Chair of the Programme Committee for the World Conference of Science Journalists 2009, I was in despair a year ago because we were sitting looking at a blank page where the programme should be. Now I'm in despair for a different reason, because we have such a wonderful programme that the big dilemma is which sessions I can actually go to and tragically which ones I'll have to miss.
On day one there is Jia Hepeng's session on Reporting science in countries with restraints which clashes with Ehsan Masood's session on Reporting creationism, which in turn clashes with my session with Nick Davies, the author of Flat Earth News and creator of the term 'churnalism'.
Then on Wednesday there is the choice between Tim Radford in conversation with Bob May, or Martin Moore's session on Whether science journalism and science PR have become too close for comfort, and I can't go to either because I'm speaking at a session with my fellow Directors of Science Media Centres in New Zealand, Australia and Canada on How science in the media looks entirely different in different countries.
I am really proud of the programme. Pallab Ghosh, President of the World Federation of Science Journalists, has been on our case the whole time to make it edgy and provocative, and he is not disappointed. Put it like this there are likely to be lots of rows and debates that will spill out into the coffee breaks and parties. This conference will generate a very real debate about very real topical controversies in science journalism.
Now all we need is the audience, so please tell everyone, let’s create even more of a buzz, WCSJ2009 is the place to be for everyone who cares about science journalism!”
Friday, 19 September 2008
How I became a physics groupie
Clock this: September 2008 – the moment that particle physics became sexy. And no-one was more surprised than me. To put it mildly, I am not known for my enthusiasm for this branch of research. In fact, to the horror of some of my colleagues, I have long argued that it's not even really Science Media Centre territory. After all, the obscure controversies that preoccupy physicists – from string theory to dark matter – are not the ones we were set up to deal with. OK, about twice a year they make it onto the five to nine slot on the Today programme, but usually the only thing we learn is that even John Humphrys can sound utterly bewildered. No… the SMC was set up to deal with the controversial science stories that impinge on real people's lives, like whether MMR causes autism, could GM crops kill and so on. Let us leave particle physics in the capable hands of the clever press officers at the Institute of Physics.
That was until last week when the switching on of the Large Hadron Collider at CERN made me feel that nothing can be as important as finding out what the universe is and how it began.
So why the religious-type conversion? I think there are a number of reasons, but foremost among them is quite simply the things physicists have said in the mass media over the past 2 weeks and the way that they've said them. They have of course done a sterling job of explaining the science – to the extent that even I have been able to answer some (though not all) of my 9-year-old's probing and incessant questions.
But what has been more compelling is the passion with which an array of media-friendly physicists made the case for curiosity-driven research. "Surely the reason we are put on this earth is to ask the really big questions like what is the Universe really made of?" said one physicist on the Today programme. Another, Professor Ted Wilson, told journalists, "In a world run by accountants looking for short term gains from any research, LHC stands out as an unusual example of mankind prepared to spend resources on pure knowledge for its own sake." And far from being even slightly defensive about the lack of any obvious life-saving applications for their work, many of the physicists have emphasized that they have no idea what they will find. When asked if he was excited by the thought of the switch-on, Professor Antonio Ereditato replied, "Yes of course. This is like opening a window on an unknown view: you expect to see mountains but maybe you see a sea shore." This sentiment was echoed by Jim al-Khalili, whose reaction to those who worry that physicists will be disappointed if they fail to find the Higgs particle was to say, "On the contrary – that will be even more exciting because it will mean that we have new mysteries to solve. No matter what we find, we will be unlocking the secrets of the Universe".
In the face of this infectious passion and enthusiasm for blue skies research, those protesting that the money could be better spent on curing cancer or tackling climate change somehow seemed churlish. I am a huge fan of David King, but his call for scientists at CERN to design their experiments with climate change in mind hit a bum note, as anyone who watched him sparring with Brian Cox on Newsnight will testify. Cox, like so many other physicists on the airwaves recently, argued that those brave enough to ask the really big questions may well be rewarded with the cures for cancer and solutions to climate change that have so far eluded a more instrumentalist approach to science. And my favourite comment of all came from my hero Mary Warnock, whose concern with the applications of human genetics has clearly not blinded her to the need for more basic research: "To say that the money would be better spent on the health service or the transport system is like saying that the only point of universities is so that students can contribute to the economy. It is philistinism attempting to murder the imagination."
The other reason I've enjoyed the CERN thing is just the sheer joy of seeing particle physics as headline news. Just think of all those tortured discussions physics press officers have had for years about how on earth you persuade the arts graduate editors that physics is sexy. Well this time they did and not just in the posh papers. All the tabloids went big on the story, with the Sun running two double page spreads in the week of the switch-on. And I'd love to know who at BBC Radio 4 made the decision months and months ago to run a live broadcast from CERN on switch-on day and dedicate the whole day to the story. In these days of dumbing down, the person who trusted any audience to understand and enjoy something as impenetrable and complex deserves an ABSW award now!
Of course some may argue that the only reason LHC ended up on the front pages was the associated scare story about the possibility of the world ending, and I know a couple of seasoned science writers who feel that the price paid for physics in the headlines was too high. Now I realize that the Science Media Centre commending a good 'scare story' is a dangerous line to take, but I shall take my life in my hands and do it anyway. I have long harboured a sneaking suspicion that it's not the scare story but the way the scientific community and media react that really matters, and this case has made me braver about saying this out loud. With the exception of Martin Rees, who referred us to the CERN safety reports, most scientists seemed to seize on the media's questions about black holes swallowing us up as just a further opportunity to engage the public about the wonder of their project. Phil Dooley, from the University of Sydney, said "No, the world won't end as LHC turns on. Instead a new world of discoveries will open up as we explore further and further into space." Brian Cox's more colloquial response, that "anyone who thinks the LHC will destroy the world is a twat" earned him a place in the Times diary: "At last particle physics has its own Liam Gallagher."
Actually, the media didn't treat this as a normal scare story either. When the Daily Mail runs a headline like 'Are we on the eve of destruction?' on page 10 you suspect something is different, and when the sub-headline reads 'Man-made hole could swallow the earth (or then again not)' you can really relax. The Sun's coverage of LHC was superb – great science, great graphics, great quotes but as ever excelling all others in their choice of headlines. 'End of the World in Nine Days….Don't panic, there's time to try out every possible position in the Kama Sutra', followed by another double page spread the day before switch-on under the headline 'More Big Bang news on Thursday …hopefully.' As well as getting to write 'twat' in the Telegraph just weeks before his departure, Roger Highfield also had fun with the story for the day of switch-on: 'If it's 8:31 and you're still reading this', read the front page headline, 'then Professor Hawking must be right', and the Today programme presenters were having such fun with the black hole scare that they were forced to read out listeners' emails reprimanding them for taking it all too lightly. The doom-mongers' scary predictions on CERN merely offered yet another platform from which physicists could work their magic.
I know almost all my blogs include a little homage to the UK's science writers, but that's because so many of the scientists I meet still view 'the media' as an amorphous thing that's out to get them. Stories like LHC should remind us that we have some of the best science journalists in the world and it is undoubtedly because of them that we have ever more editors prepared to take a punt on putting complex and difficult science onto the front page. I have seen, read and heard some fantastic journalism over the past few weeks from our science hacks, and I think that as with the media's coverage of human-animal embryos, it is often the combination of great scientists with the best of science journalism that creates the magic. Anyone who has listened to Tom Feilden's many, many reports on Today will know what I mean, and here is just one short excerpt from Mark Henderson's coverage in the Times: "It is fitting that it is housed in caverns so large that they could hold the naves of great churches like Westminster abbey. These are cathedrals of a different kind, which celebrate the glory of knowledge and discovery."
And of course as a press officer I am well aware that none of this would have happened without the unsung and sterling efforts of press officers behind the scenes. Press officers at CERN, the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) and the Institute of Physics have been fantastic and seized on every aspect of this historic event to promote the wonder of science and showcase their specialism in the best possible way. I have absolutely no doubt that many of the world's future scientists will cite this moment as the spur to pursue a career in science. Tara Shears, a particle physicist at Liverpool who will be analyzing the data, was yet another scientist who seemed to be able to articulate beautifully what the switch- on means for her generation of young scientists: "Everything is ready. We are now going headlong into this journey into the unknown. It really is a bit like a moon landing for us." OK – so I still don't understand particle physics – but I have shared this kind of excitement and, more importantly, it seems so did the entire media and the public.
That was until last week when the switching on of the Large Hadron Collider at CERN made me feel that nothing can be as important as finding out what the universe is and how it began.
So why the religious-type conversion? I think there are a number of reasons, but foremost among them is quite simply the things physicists have said in the mass media over the past 2 weeks and the way that they've said them. They have of course done a sterling job of explaining the science – to the extent that even I have been able to answer some (though not all) of my 9-year-old's probing and incessant questions.
But what has been more compelling is the passion with which an array of media-friendly physicists made the case for curiosity-driven research. "Surely the reason we are put on this earth is to ask the really big questions like what is the Universe really made of?" said one physicist on the Today programme. Another, Professor Ted Wilson, told journalists, "In a world run by accountants looking for short term gains from any research, LHC stands out as an unusual example of mankind prepared to spend resources on pure knowledge for its own sake." And far from being even slightly defensive about the lack of any obvious life-saving applications for their work, many of the physicists have emphasized that they have no idea what they will find. When asked if he was excited by the thought of the switch-on, Professor Antonio Ereditato replied, "Yes of course. This is like opening a window on an unknown view: you expect to see mountains but maybe you see a sea shore." This sentiment was echoed by Jim al-Khalili, whose reaction to those who worry that physicists will be disappointed if they fail to find the Higgs particle was to say, "On the contrary – that will be even more exciting because it will mean that we have new mysteries to solve. No matter what we find, we will be unlocking the secrets of the Universe".
In the face of this infectious passion and enthusiasm for blue skies research, those protesting that the money could be better spent on curing cancer or tackling climate change somehow seemed churlish. I am a huge fan of David King, but his call for scientists at CERN to design their experiments with climate change in mind hit a bum note, as anyone who watched him sparring with Brian Cox on Newsnight will testify. Cox, like so many other physicists on the airwaves recently, argued that those brave enough to ask the really big questions may well be rewarded with the cures for cancer and solutions to climate change that have so far eluded a more instrumentalist approach to science. And my favourite comment of all came from my hero Mary Warnock, whose concern with the applications of human genetics has clearly not blinded her to the need for more basic research: "To say that the money would be better spent on the health service or the transport system is like saying that the only point of universities is so that students can contribute to the economy. It is philistinism attempting to murder the imagination."
The other reason I've enjoyed the CERN thing is just the sheer joy of seeing particle physics as headline news. Just think of all those tortured discussions physics press officers have had for years about how on earth you persuade the arts graduate editors that physics is sexy. Well this time they did and not just in the posh papers. All the tabloids went big on the story, with the Sun running two double page spreads in the week of the switch-on. And I'd love to know who at BBC Radio 4 made the decision months and months ago to run a live broadcast from CERN on switch-on day and dedicate the whole day to the story. In these days of dumbing down, the person who trusted any audience to understand and enjoy something as impenetrable and complex deserves an ABSW award now!
Of course some may argue that the only reason LHC ended up on the front pages was the associated scare story about the possibility of the world ending, and I know a couple of seasoned science writers who feel that the price paid for physics in the headlines was too high. Now I realize that the Science Media Centre commending a good 'scare story' is a dangerous line to take, but I shall take my life in my hands and do it anyway. I have long harboured a sneaking suspicion that it's not the scare story but the way the scientific community and media react that really matters, and this case has made me braver about saying this out loud. With the exception of Martin Rees, who referred us to the CERN safety reports, most scientists seemed to seize on the media's questions about black holes swallowing us up as just a further opportunity to engage the public about the wonder of their project. Phil Dooley, from the University of Sydney, said "No, the world won't end as LHC turns on. Instead a new world of discoveries will open up as we explore further and further into space." Brian Cox's more colloquial response, that "anyone who thinks the LHC will destroy the world is a twat" earned him a place in the Times diary: "At last particle physics has its own Liam Gallagher."
Actually, the media didn't treat this as a normal scare story either. When the Daily Mail runs a headline like 'Are we on the eve of destruction?' on page 10 you suspect something is different, and when the sub-headline reads 'Man-made hole could swallow the earth (or then again not)' you can really relax. The Sun's coverage of LHC was superb – great science, great graphics, great quotes but as ever excelling all others in their choice of headlines. 'End of the World in Nine Days….Don't panic, there's time to try out every possible position in the Kama Sutra', followed by another double page spread the day before switch-on under the headline 'More Big Bang news on Thursday …hopefully.' As well as getting to write 'twat' in the Telegraph just weeks before his departure, Roger Highfield also had fun with the story for the day of switch-on: 'If it's 8:31 and you're still reading this', read the front page headline, 'then Professor Hawking must be right', and the Today programme presenters were having such fun with the black hole scare that they were forced to read out listeners' emails reprimanding them for taking it all too lightly. The doom-mongers' scary predictions on CERN merely offered yet another platform from which physicists could work their magic.
I know almost all my blogs include a little homage to the UK's science writers, but that's because so many of the scientists I meet still view 'the media' as an amorphous thing that's out to get them. Stories like LHC should remind us that we have some of the best science journalists in the world and it is undoubtedly because of them that we have ever more editors prepared to take a punt on putting complex and difficult science onto the front page. I have seen, read and heard some fantastic journalism over the past few weeks from our science hacks, and I think that as with the media's coverage of human-animal embryos, it is often the combination of great scientists with the best of science journalism that creates the magic. Anyone who has listened to Tom Feilden's many, many reports on Today will know what I mean, and here is just one short excerpt from Mark Henderson's coverage in the Times: "It is fitting that it is housed in caverns so large that they could hold the naves of great churches like Westminster abbey. These are cathedrals of a different kind, which celebrate the glory of knowledge and discovery."
And of course as a press officer I am well aware that none of this would have happened without the unsung and sterling efforts of press officers behind the scenes. Press officers at CERN, the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) and the Institute of Physics have been fantastic and seized on every aspect of this historic event to promote the wonder of science and showcase their specialism in the best possible way. I have absolutely no doubt that many of the world's future scientists will cite this moment as the spur to pursue a career in science. Tara Shears, a particle physicist at Liverpool who will be analyzing the data, was yet another scientist who seemed to be able to articulate beautifully what the switch- on means for her generation of young scientists: "Everything is ready. We are now going headlong into this journey into the unknown. It really is a bit like a moon landing for us." OK – so I still don't understand particle physics – but I have shared this kind of excitement and, more importantly, it seems so did the entire media and the public.
Friday, 16 May 2008
Nick Davies' Flat Earth News and 'churnalism' - myth or reality?
Anyone interested in the media and science should read Nick Davies' Flat Earth News, described on the dust jacket as 'exposing falsehood, distortion and propaganda in the Global Media'. Davies, a Guardian reporter, took a break from Fleet Street to apply his trademark investigative reporting skills to his own trade – breaking the unspoken rule of journalism that 'dog doesn't eat dog'. And he is paying the price – one newspaper editor interviewed on the Today programme spewed out a list of insults about Davies and the book and I haven't yet read a good review – even in his own paper. But, love it or hate it, no-one can deny that Davies has kicked off an important and much needed debate.
Within just weeks of publication it seems that 'churnalism' has already entered the vocabulary of anyone commenting on the media, and for me this is by far the most important aspect of Davies' wide ranging critique. 'Churnalism' is shorthand for a media that is now too commercially driven, too obsessed with speed and too understaffed to produce original and accurate journalism. In Davies own words: "Working in a news factory, without the time to check, without the chance to go out and make contacts and find leads, reporters are reduced to churnalism, to the passive processing of material which overwhelmingly tends to be supplied for them by outsiders, particularly wire agencies and PR."
Having been one of those who 'supplied' the media for over 20 years now I recognise Davies' charting of the changes. At the start of my career my relationship with journalists was much more one of separate individual journalists plying me for information, exclusive stories and new leads on lengthy investigations. Now things feel very different and it's not just the long boozy lunches that have disappeared. My starting point now is the need to adapt the most complex science to fit the needs of a group of science and health reporters who are routinely working on at least two or three stories a day and increasingly also being asked to adapt them to web news, podcasts, video clips, etc.
Having read this book I had to concede that the Science Media Centre's success can be largely attributed to the current condition of the media. We state that our role is to 'adapt the best science to the needs of the fast moving 24 hour media' and we take some pride in the fact that we do this on a daily basis. But I suspect Davies' would accuse us 'spoon feeding' journalists.
And on the face of it, it would be easy to look at the SMC's operation and call it a classic example of 'churnalism' – packaging science on a plate and presenting it to over-worked journalists in bite-size chunks that fit their time-frame and format. And it's not just us – go to any of the annual major science conferences from the AAAS to the BA Festival and watch the media operation – it's almost unheard of for any of the science reporters to actually attend any sessions or mix with the scientists or public attending the conference. Instead they stay in separate buildings, attend a series of 20 minute press briefings and hear a five minute version of what the festival press officers have identified as the most newsworthy talks taking place at the conference.
I watched with absolute amazement at my first AAAS in Seattle four years ago when David King, the then Chief Scientific Adviser to the UK Government, enraged the press corps at his early morning briefing by failing to give them the top line of his major speech on climate change to be delivered to the main conference later that day. Looking on passively at the explosion of anger from the press corps at the end of his briefing I couldn't quite decide where I stood. Obviously given that his later talk would have been too late for their deadlines, I could understand their frustration – but the level of bile and anger spewed over King's hapless press officer for daring to ask that journalists actually attend his lecture and listen to the whole speech was a sight to behold. Clearly journalists have now come to expect, rely on and indeed demand that science adapts to their timescales. While I couldn't help having a sneaking admiration for Dave King's bravery I also made a mental note not to let anything like that happen on my watch!
Given that more than half of the press briefings we ran last year were our trademark 'background' briefings rather than new research, it stands to reason that all of these stories were out there for the taking if journalists had the time to leave the office and hunt them out. The fact that stem cell experts back in 2005 were considering using animal eggs in therapeutic cloning; the fact that paediatricians are operating in a climate of fear of reporting child abuse after Southall and Meadow; the fact that pharmacologists believe that lives are at risk because clinical pharmacology is being written out of medical training; the fact that the scientific community are lobbying the Government for better regulation of animal research; the fact that scientists are working on ways of processing foods that could help us lose weight; the fact that researchers in Aberystwyth have long ago worked out a way of reducing farting and belching from cows that will reduce methane emissions – I could go on and on. All of these stories were generated by what Davies calls 'churnalism' – delivered by the Science Media Centre press officers to a room of journalists rather than dug out by individual journalists investigating their own stories
But here's the question – does it matter? According to Davies "Fabrication is at the heart of PR , the fabrication of news which is designed to open the media door...PR is clearly inherently unreliable as a source of truth simply because it is designed to serve an interest." That description applies to much of PR but it is a deeply flawed generalization. Many institutions employ press officers because they generate real news and need to react to real news. I'm sure the press team at the British Veterinary Association occasionally do 'PR' to get coverage – but my only experience of them over the past few years is of an amazing team working weekends and evenings to help the news media get access to the UK's best experts on foot and mouth, bird flu, bluetongue and so on. And that applies to many of the science press officers that we deal with.
Yes the SMC packages stories – but all the stories we offer to journalists have been brought to us by a number of top scientists and their press officers, verified as significant by our many scientific advisers and written up by specialist journalists who use the briefing to interrogate the experts. In other words 'churnalism' is not always 'flat earth news'
Having used researchers at Cardiff University to analyse the source of the stories in the media for a sustained period, Davies concludes that over 60% of stories in the quality print media came "wholly or mainly from wire copy or PR material" and a further 20% that "contained clear elements of PR" and only 12% that could be classed as truly original reporting. According to Cardiff researchers: "Taken together, these data portray a picture of journalism in which any meaningful journalistic activity by the press is the exception rather than the rule."
Maybe so but where is the evidence that, because the stories were facilitated by press officers and packaged to suit reporters, they are not the truth? I would say in every single case the stories generated by SMC briefings were the kind of truth-telling stories that Davies champions. Perhaps Davies and all those concerned about the state of the media need to have a more discriminating and discerning look at PR and media relations. Maybe we need to reject corporate and institutional spin while championing a new breed of science press officers who feel that their role is to answer Davies' call to arms to improve science and health reporting.
Having said all that, I think many of the journalists I know would be the first to agree with Davies that they would love to be liberated from having to churn out so called 'diary' stories on a daily basis. Davies' fascinating chapter on the kind of luxurious timelines and resources enjoyed by the Sunday Times in the 1970s, in the heyday of their award-winning Insight Team, gives the lie to the editors' refrain that that there was no golden age of investigative reporting. The concept that a journalist may have days, weeks, even years to investigate a story is so alien it is hard to grasp. But there are enough veteran science reporters around to testify to a time when it was different. Anyone who has heard Tim Radford, the much-loved former science editor at the Guardian, will be in no doubt that his golden age was a time when he was allowed to spend most of his time out of the office spending time with scientists who occasionally let slip an amazing story. Nigel Hawkes, our equally respected health editor at the Times, is one of the few journalists quoted in Davies' book: "We are churning stories today, not writing them. Almost everything is recycled from another source…the work has been de-skilled".
Davies is illuminating something important here, and to his credit he repeatedly reminds us that our many talented journalists are the victims of this process not the instigators. Mark Henderson, the Times' science editor, would not get so many front page exclusives sitting in his office churning out stories, and some journalists like Sarah Boseley at the Guardian manage to do the diary stuff and then somehow produce a seven page feature revealing the true background to some news story. And there are many more examples of journalists that we work with flouting all the pressure and norms to produce original journalism.
I also happen to think that our main allies in this battle being fought by science press officers for a better media are the science, health and environment reporters in the media. As Davies points out, there are some terrible examples of grossly inaccurate media coverage in the news in recent years – but almost all of them have been written by non specialist reporters. Just this week we have seen what happens to the quality of reporting of human-animal hybrid embryos when the story passes from the science and health journalists to the political or lobby correspondents.
Obviously Davies' book is a critique of the modern media and as such legitimately shines a great spotlight on the problem areas. But the reality for those of us in science media relations is that we spend a lot of time celebrating amazing science reporting. To me, the fact that the Mail's science and health reporters can produce such accurate copy in the kind of atmosphere that Davies describes is nothing short of a triumph. Similarly, the fact that John Von Radowitz, the Press Association's science reporter, is churning out up to ten stories per shift can also be reason to comment on the genius of a reporter like John who can sit through an incredibly complex science briefing that would confound many scientists and translate that into a 500 word popular science story within half an hour . None of this is to challenge Davies' thesis – it is just to say that for those of us at the sharp end, there are plenty of reasons to cheer as well as to despair.
Within just weeks of publication it seems that 'churnalism' has already entered the vocabulary of anyone commenting on the media, and for me this is by far the most important aspect of Davies' wide ranging critique. 'Churnalism' is shorthand for a media that is now too commercially driven, too obsessed with speed and too understaffed to produce original and accurate journalism. In Davies own words: "Working in a news factory, without the time to check, without the chance to go out and make contacts and find leads, reporters are reduced to churnalism, to the passive processing of material which overwhelmingly tends to be supplied for them by outsiders, particularly wire agencies and PR."
Having been one of those who 'supplied' the media for over 20 years now I recognise Davies' charting of the changes. At the start of my career my relationship with journalists was much more one of separate individual journalists plying me for information, exclusive stories and new leads on lengthy investigations. Now things feel very different and it's not just the long boozy lunches that have disappeared. My starting point now is the need to adapt the most complex science to fit the needs of a group of science and health reporters who are routinely working on at least two or three stories a day and increasingly also being asked to adapt them to web news, podcasts, video clips, etc.
Having read this book I had to concede that the Science Media Centre's success can be largely attributed to the current condition of the media. We state that our role is to 'adapt the best science to the needs of the fast moving 24 hour media' and we take some pride in the fact that we do this on a daily basis. But I suspect Davies' would accuse us 'spoon feeding' journalists.
And on the face of it, it would be easy to look at the SMC's operation and call it a classic example of 'churnalism' – packaging science on a plate and presenting it to over-worked journalists in bite-size chunks that fit their time-frame and format. And it's not just us – go to any of the annual major science conferences from the AAAS to the BA Festival and watch the media operation – it's almost unheard of for any of the science reporters to actually attend any sessions or mix with the scientists or public attending the conference. Instead they stay in separate buildings, attend a series of 20 minute press briefings and hear a five minute version of what the festival press officers have identified as the most newsworthy talks taking place at the conference.
I watched with absolute amazement at my first AAAS in Seattle four years ago when David King, the then Chief Scientific Adviser to the UK Government, enraged the press corps at his early morning briefing by failing to give them the top line of his major speech on climate change to be delivered to the main conference later that day. Looking on passively at the explosion of anger from the press corps at the end of his briefing I couldn't quite decide where I stood. Obviously given that his later talk would have been too late for their deadlines, I could understand their frustration – but the level of bile and anger spewed over King's hapless press officer for daring to ask that journalists actually attend his lecture and listen to the whole speech was a sight to behold. Clearly journalists have now come to expect, rely on and indeed demand that science adapts to their timescales. While I couldn't help having a sneaking admiration for Dave King's bravery I also made a mental note not to let anything like that happen on my watch!
Given that more than half of the press briefings we ran last year were our trademark 'background' briefings rather than new research, it stands to reason that all of these stories were out there for the taking if journalists had the time to leave the office and hunt them out. The fact that stem cell experts back in 2005 were considering using animal eggs in therapeutic cloning; the fact that paediatricians are operating in a climate of fear of reporting child abuse after Southall and Meadow; the fact that pharmacologists believe that lives are at risk because clinical pharmacology is being written out of medical training; the fact that the scientific community are lobbying the Government for better regulation of animal research; the fact that scientists are working on ways of processing foods that could help us lose weight; the fact that researchers in Aberystwyth have long ago worked out a way of reducing farting and belching from cows that will reduce methane emissions – I could go on and on. All of these stories were generated by what Davies calls 'churnalism' – delivered by the Science Media Centre press officers to a room of journalists rather than dug out by individual journalists investigating their own stories
But here's the question – does it matter? According to Davies "Fabrication is at the heart of PR , the fabrication of news which is designed to open the media door...PR is clearly inherently unreliable as a source of truth simply because it is designed to serve an interest." That description applies to much of PR but it is a deeply flawed generalization. Many institutions employ press officers because they generate real news and need to react to real news. I'm sure the press team at the British Veterinary Association occasionally do 'PR' to get coverage – but my only experience of them over the past few years is of an amazing team working weekends and evenings to help the news media get access to the UK's best experts on foot and mouth, bird flu, bluetongue and so on. And that applies to many of the science press officers that we deal with.
Yes the SMC packages stories – but all the stories we offer to journalists have been brought to us by a number of top scientists and their press officers, verified as significant by our many scientific advisers and written up by specialist journalists who use the briefing to interrogate the experts. In other words 'churnalism' is not always 'flat earth news'
Having used researchers at Cardiff University to analyse the source of the stories in the media for a sustained period, Davies concludes that over 60% of stories in the quality print media came "wholly or mainly from wire copy or PR material" and a further 20% that "contained clear elements of PR" and only 12% that could be classed as truly original reporting. According to Cardiff researchers: "Taken together, these data portray a picture of journalism in which any meaningful journalistic activity by the press is the exception rather than the rule."
Maybe so but where is the evidence that, because the stories were facilitated by press officers and packaged to suit reporters, they are not the truth? I would say in every single case the stories generated by SMC briefings were the kind of truth-telling stories that Davies champions. Perhaps Davies and all those concerned about the state of the media need to have a more discriminating and discerning look at PR and media relations. Maybe we need to reject corporate and institutional spin while championing a new breed of science press officers who feel that their role is to answer Davies' call to arms to improve science and health reporting.
Having said all that, I think many of the journalists I know would be the first to agree with Davies that they would love to be liberated from having to churn out so called 'diary' stories on a daily basis. Davies' fascinating chapter on the kind of luxurious timelines and resources enjoyed by the Sunday Times in the 1970s, in the heyday of their award-winning Insight Team, gives the lie to the editors' refrain that that there was no golden age of investigative reporting. The concept that a journalist may have days, weeks, even years to investigate a story is so alien it is hard to grasp. But there are enough veteran science reporters around to testify to a time when it was different. Anyone who has heard Tim Radford, the much-loved former science editor at the Guardian, will be in no doubt that his golden age was a time when he was allowed to spend most of his time out of the office spending time with scientists who occasionally let slip an amazing story. Nigel Hawkes, our equally respected health editor at the Times, is one of the few journalists quoted in Davies' book: "We are churning stories today, not writing them. Almost everything is recycled from another source…the work has been de-skilled".
Davies is illuminating something important here, and to his credit he repeatedly reminds us that our many talented journalists are the victims of this process not the instigators. Mark Henderson, the Times' science editor, would not get so many front page exclusives sitting in his office churning out stories, and some journalists like Sarah Boseley at the Guardian manage to do the diary stuff and then somehow produce a seven page feature revealing the true background to some news story. And there are many more examples of journalists that we work with flouting all the pressure and norms to produce original journalism.
I also happen to think that our main allies in this battle being fought by science press officers for a better media are the science, health and environment reporters in the media. As Davies points out, there are some terrible examples of grossly inaccurate media coverage in the news in recent years – but almost all of them have been written by non specialist reporters. Just this week we have seen what happens to the quality of reporting of human-animal hybrid embryos when the story passes from the science and health journalists to the political or lobby correspondents.
Obviously Davies' book is a critique of the modern media and as such legitimately shines a great spotlight on the problem areas. But the reality for those of us in science media relations is that we spend a lot of time celebrating amazing science reporting. To me, the fact that the Mail's science and health reporters can produce such accurate copy in the kind of atmosphere that Davies describes is nothing short of a triumph. Similarly, the fact that John Von Radowitz, the Press Association's science reporter, is churning out up to ten stories per shift can also be reason to comment on the genius of a reporter like John who can sit through an incredibly complex science briefing that would confound many scientists and translate that into a 500 word popular science story within half an hour . None of this is to challenge Davies' thesis – it is just to say that for those of us at the sharp end, there are plenty of reasons to cheer as well as to despair.
Friday, 9 May 2008
Where should politicians get their scientific advice?
Where should politicians get their scientific advice? Anywhere except the headlines!
God knows how, but I have managed to reach my 40s without ever having attended a party conference. However last year I managed to make it to Bournemouth to the Labour Party Conference after being asked by the Social Market Foundation (SMF) and the Food Standards Agency (FSA) to speak at their fringe meeting on how governments get their scientific advice. I did protest that I was the wrong person for the panel, but they were adamant that they wanted at least one person to address the role for the media in this area - this is what I said:
Well I’m the one person on this panel not qualified to talk about how the Government gets its advice on science so I shall restrict myself to saying this – wherever they do get it, they should NOT be getting it from the media.
In my five years at the Science Media Centre (SMC) I have organised hundreds of media briefings on complex and often controversial new science. I think the UK has some of the best science and health reporters in the world and almost all the coverage is accurate BUT at the same time as being accurate it almost always partial, simplified, de-nuanced, and ever so slightly exaggerated and as a result can be misleading - and I suspect that most journalists would be the first to acknowledge that.
A topical example of why politicians should not take their science from the media comes in the coverage of the recent FSA/University of Southampton study on the behavioural effects of artificial additives in food. We were getting calls from journalists reporting on this study, so I contacted several leading nutritionists and toxicologists to ask for their opinions. They all came back with strikingly similar answers:
1. It’s a good study but it does not give us definitive answers
2. It doesn’t say which additives are responsible for the effects or make a distinction whether the responsibility lay with the additives or with preservatives
3. The size of the effect was small – with an increase in hyperactivity of less than a tenth of that seen with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)
4. It shows an association – but does not prove a direct cause and effect
5. This hypothesis needs further investigation
So that’s what experts thought. Now let’s look at what headline writers thought:
New Link Between E Numbers And Hyperactivity (The Independent)
E numbers 'link' to manic kids (Daily Mirror)
Food Additives Make Children Behave Badly (The Times)
Parents warned over food additives (Daily Mail)
Now I am not even criticizing the media here, because there was enough in this study to give them these kind of headlines. But what I am saying is that no self respecting politician should base policy on the media coverage of this science. I gather Gordon Brown came out that day to say he favours the removal of these additives. If Brown favours a ban on taste grounds, or moral grounds or democratic grounds then that’s fine by me. However the timing of his comments suggests to me that his view is based on rather misleading media reports of this research and that, I would say, is a long way away from evidence-based policy.
There is other worrying evidence that politicians are too often basing their policies on the media reports rather than the actual science. On the question of biomedical research on human-animal hybrid embryos, it is widely believed that ministers proposal to ban this research last December was heavily influenced by 'Frankenbunny' headlines and pictures of humans with cows heads. Subsequently, when the scientists came out fighting and generated what I think were the 'right' kind of headlines, the Government relented and it now looks like the research will be allowed to continue. As my friend, Professor Chris Shaw, said "Scientists-1; Scaremongers–0". But my question is, why the Government considers bans or green lights on such hugely important areas of research on the basis of news headlines?
A couple of years ago, a group of conservationists from the University of Oxford had a paper published in the journal Nature which was a fascinating deconstruction of a news story 'gone wrong'. They discovered that because of the misunderstanding of a scientific term Р'committed to extinction' (which apparently means something very different to 'will be extinct'), the entire media ran a grossly inaccurate story about a million species being wiped out by climate change. But what really shocked the scientists was that politicians had repeated the inaccurate figures РMargot Wallstr̦m had raised it in the EU and Margaret Beckett in the House of Commons. You could say that the scientists' idea that Beckett would spend hours poring over impenetrable language in the original paper just reveals their naivety Рbut I suspect the public too would rather like to think that when politicians cite a scientific study in Parliament that they are citing it accurately and not repeating sensationalised headlines.
So while I spend my working life persuading more scientists to engage with the media and passionately believe that scientists ignore the media at their peril, the more I see the disjuncture between the detailed research and the story, the more I want to encourage both the public and the policy makers to take a closer look. The news media does many great things for science: getting us talking about science, raising the alarm, setting the agenda, offering us fresh hopes of new solutions. It is, and is likely to remain, a poor place for politicians to get their scientific advice.
God knows how, but I have managed to reach my 40s without ever having attended a party conference. However last year I managed to make it to Bournemouth to the Labour Party Conference after being asked by the Social Market Foundation (SMF) and the Food Standards Agency (FSA) to speak at their fringe meeting on how governments get their scientific advice. I did protest that I was the wrong person for the panel, but they were adamant that they wanted at least one person to address the role for the media in this area - this is what I said:
Well I’m the one person on this panel not qualified to talk about how the Government gets its advice on science so I shall restrict myself to saying this – wherever they do get it, they should NOT be getting it from the media.
In my five years at the Science Media Centre (SMC) I have organised hundreds of media briefings on complex and often controversial new science. I think the UK has some of the best science and health reporters in the world and almost all the coverage is accurate BUT at the same time as being accurate it almost always partial, simplified, de-nuanced, and ever so slightly exaggerated and as a result can be misleading - and I suspect that most journalists would be the first to acknowledge that.
A topical example of why politicians should not take their science from the media comes in the coverage of the recent FSA/University of Southampton study on the behavioural effects of artificial additives in food. We were getting calls from journalists reporting on this study, so I contacted several leading nutritionists and toxicologists to ask for their opinions. They all came back with strikingly similar answers:
1. It’s a good study but it does not give us definitive answers
2. It doesn’t say which additives are responsible for the effects or make a distinction whether the responsibility lay with the additives or with preservatives
3. The size of the effect was small – with an increase in hyperactivity of less than a tenth of that seen with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)
4. It shows an association – but does not prove a direct cause and effect
5. This hypothesis needs further investigation
So that’s what experts thought. Now let’s look at what headline writers thought:
New Link Between E Numbers And Hyperactivity (The Independent)
E numbers 'link' to manic kids (Daily Mirror)
Food Additives Make Children Behave Badly (The Times)
Parents warned over food additives (Daily Mail)
Now I am not even criticizing the media here, because there was enough in this study to give them these kind of headlines. But what I am saying is that no self respecting politician should base policy on the media coverage of this science. I gather Gordon Brown came out that day to say he favours the removal of these additives. If Brown favours a ban on taste grounds, or moral grounds or democratic grounds then that’s fine by me. However the timing of his comments suggests to me that his view is based on rather misleading media reports of this research and that, I would say, is a long way away from evidence-based policy.
There is other worrying evidence that politicians are too often basing their policies on the media reports rather than the actual science. On the question of biomedical research on human-animal hybrid embryos, it is widely believed that ministers proposal to ban this research last December was heavily influenced by 'Frankenbunny' headlines and pictures of humans with cows heads. Subsequently, when the scientists came out fighting and generated what I think were the 'right' kind of headlines, the Government relented and it now looks like the research will be allowed to continue. As my friend, Professor Chris Shaw, said "Scientists-1; Scaremongers–0". But my question is, why the Government considers bans or green lights on such hugely important areas of research on the basis of news headlines?
A couple of years ago, a group of conservationists from the University of Oxford had a paper published in the journal Nature which was a fascinating deconstruction of a news story 'gone wrong'. They discovered that because of the misunderstanding of a scientific term Р'committed to extinction' (which apparently means something very different to 'will be extinct'), the entire media ran a grossly inaccurate story about a million species being wiped out by climate change. But what really shocked the scientists was that politicians had repeated the inaccurate figures РMargot Wallstr̦m had raised it in the EU and Margaret Beckett in the House of Commons. You could say that the scientists' idea that Beckett would spend hours poring over impenetrable language in the original paper just reveals their naivety Рbut I suspect the public too would rather like to think that when politicians cite a scientific study in Parliament that they are citing it accurately and not repeating sensationalised headlines.
So while I spend my working life persuading more scientists to engage with the media and passionately believe that scientists ignore the media at their peril, the more I see the disjuncture between the detailed research and the story, the more I want to encourage both the public and the policy makers to take a closer look. The news media does many great things for science: getting us talking about science, raising the alarm, setting the agenda, offering us fresh hopes of new solutions. It is, and is likely to remain, a poor place for politicians to get their scientific advice.
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