Rachel Mason is Associate Director for Science Made Simple - the Action Against Stunting Hub’s public engagement partner. Working with the Hub's research groups to translate their science messages for non-technical audiences and helping them connect with key audiences.

 

Surprising though it may seem, researchers... people love to hear about your work.

They want to know about the problems you are trying to solve and the ways you are trying to do it. They want to know what kind of person you are and what brought you to the path you are taking.

They want to engage with you.

 

What do ‘they’ get out of it?

The public is not one audience, but a whole array of different ones. Each audience has a different need and direction of interest.

Teachers want what you can provide in making learning in schools relevant, interesting and embedded in a real-world context.

School students want to see something novel and enriching in the classroom; and it is valuable for them to meet someone like them, to help boost their confidence to further their own learning and life aspirations.

Adult groups want to hear a good story, and they want to know where public money is being spent. They want to know why they should care about the research you are doing.

Policy makers – politicians and their officers, government agencies, non-governmental organizations – need to know about your work to help direct and inform theirs.

Parents want to provide their children with experiences that enrich and entertain, and broaden their horizons.

 

Simple techniques to make your research engaging

Often, when we work with researchers to develop public engagement activities, they worry that people won’t be interested, or their work is too niche and hard to explain or understand.

But you are interested, so it must be interesting!

People ARE interested. It’s the way you tell it that makes all the difference, so here are few things to consider when putting together your own public engagement plans.

Whether you are planning to deliver a presentation or workshop in a school, provide evidence for a policy group, join a family open day, or appear on TV or radio, there are some basic things you might consider incorporating to tickle up the interest of your audience.

Talk about yourself

Those of us who have taken the path of academic research will know that we are supposed to keep our work impersonal, dispassionate. But folks just aren’t like that in their daily lives. We all like to connect with each other on a personal level.

So, you may need to turn your academic focus on its head. Give your students a little of yourself – where you’re from, what your hobbies are, what gets you fired up to study what you do. Show yourself as a warm and ordinary human being BEFORE you talk about your research.

Keep it light

You don’t need to extract belly laughs from your audience – that’s not what I mean here. (Although if you are confident and have funny in your research, don’t hold back.). But people like fun. Honestly. And there is plenty of research out there that supports the idea that folks learn better and remember more when they are having a good time. So really, it’s just about not taking yourself and your work too seriously, and letting people in gently - with a little joy - to what you have to say.

Start with something light and accessible. This is something that has been a big challenge for the Action Against Stunting Hub. When the research is all about the lives and good growth of children in some of the most challenging conditions, it can be hard to find the light and fun.

(The good thing about children is that they are really good at this. Ask a child if you’re not sure what’s fun about your research.)

Tell a story, paint a picture

We all love a story, so tell one. One of the really wonderful things about working on the Action Against Stunting Hub is the broader experiences we encounter alongside the research: wonderful landscapes, fascinating food, vibrant cultures and welcoming people, airport departure halls (and loooong waits), problems to solve, funny moments, gifts given and received, friendships. These experiences are worth sharing when engaging with your audience – they add colour and bring seemingly distant work a little closer. They create memory hooks to help students recall their learning and connect your story to their personal lives.

Bring a thing

On the subject of memory hooks, not everyone assimilates information in the same way. So, while PowerPoint presentations are great for putting over lots of information clearly and efficiently, not everyone finds this the best way to take information in.

Try to invoke all the senses when planning your engagement activity. People understand you better when they have something to touch, something to hear, smell, taste and see. You wouldn’t buy something to eat as a result of a slide show about it, would you? You’d taste it.

So include objects in your story – and let people have go with them.

 

Ok, so what do you get out of it?

It might be a bit more closely connected for some audiences than others, but there is always something you get out of it.

There is the more obvious career-development reason that engaging a range of people in a range of ways with your research will develop transferrable skills, appropriate for most careers in industry or academia.

Connecting with people outside your research area, very simply, will give you new perspectives on your work and help you see it through their eyes. Don’t fall into the trap of thinking that if people don’t ‘get’ your technical stuff, they won’t have anything to contribute. And that's just not worth the bother. If they don’t get it, chances are you didn’t find a good way to help them. Once people do get it, these audiences can be full of surprises to help you progress.

 

Final thoughts

Pause for thought – public engagement is not about what you want people to know; it’s about what they want to know. Put your audience first. Frame your engagement in way that helps them ask questions in a way that’s comfortable for them, not what’s convenient for you.

This can often mean using methods you’re not used to or that take you outside your comfort zone. It can mean meeting people on their own turf, not on yours. And it can mean being ready to work simply, ditching ideas that aren't working, and stepping a good way back from the detail of your research.

You don't need to work it all out alone though. Find out more about public engagement with research NCCPE (publicengagement.ac.uk)