Sir

If science communicators, as characterized by Steve Fuller in Correspondence (“Communication should not be left to scientists”, Nature 416, 475; 2002), are members of a “mediating profession”, then teachers must surely be too.

Science reporters and producers — writing or broadcasting stories about science — provide most of society with its adult science education. They are intermediaries between scientists and the public, two groups who rarely meet face to face. We institutional press and public-affairs officers, as you rightly suggest in your Opinion article in the same issue (Nature 416, 461; 2002), often provide the conduit for communication between scientists and science writers and editors.

Effective science communication requires a jack-of-all-tradesmanship uncommon in other, more specialized fields. Science communicators need to understand and interpret the scientific process and its fruits; to grasp at least the rudiments of myriad disparate disciplines of study; to translate scientific jargon into language a lay audience can understand; and to persuade editors and producers that stories warrant space or time. We are like diplomats, deftly shuttling back and forth between foreign cultures.

I was not formally trained in the sciences. If scientists can explain their work to me such that I understand it, and even go a step further and imbue me with their enthusiasm for the research, I can develop a story that will interest, intrigue and inform editors and, in turn, their readers, viewers or listeners.

This is a collaborative process in which the scientist not only submits to an interview, but also reviews drafts for accuracy. It is a time-consuming process: for the scientist, this means time taken away from his or her research. Scientists might ask whether it is worth it, and what's in it for them.

The ready answer is: recognition in the form of favourable publicity, with increased chances of funding. A more high-minded response could be the importance to civilized societies of a well-informed populace.

Public-relations professionals — science communicators among them — promote their clients' work rather than their own, which may be why we're not widely appreciated. Derisive nicknames like 'spin doctor' derive from the politicians you aptly credit with media savvy in your Opinion article. 'Spin' refers to nothing more nefarious than the angle from which a story is told to convey the desired message.

Among other misperceptions about public relations is the belief that the practice requires no special skills and that anybody can do it. I once heard the president of a prominent US public-relations company assure his employees that what they do “is not brain surgery” — nevertheless, it is not child's play either.

The prerequisite to successful professional communication is the ability to communicate well and creatively, in speaking and writing. Understanding how the media work — including knowing the sort of story most likely to be published, being sensitive to deadlines and using tactics intended to make journalists' jobs easier — is key, as is the ability to apply strategies for managing crises and controversies.

By following your recommendation that they take a more active role in telling the “real” story, scientists will help to solve some of the genuine problems besetting science communication.

For instance, most of what constitutes science coverage in major newspapers and consumer magazines are medical and health stories. (All the examples in your editorial are medical.) It is human nature for people to be most interested in what affects them personally. The greatest challenge by far to science public-affairs officers is finding a way to interest editors in research that does not have an immediately apparent consequence for their readers.

“Significant breakthroughs” are the only other aspects of science widely considered to be newsworthy; hence the exaggerated claims made in some press releases. People raised in the twentieth century have learned to think of science in terms of amazing discoveries, their imaginations captivated by space exploration or developments in technology that improve their daily lives. Such an audience is less easily moved by the fine points of the disciplines within my purview, such as evolution, ecology, systematics and taxonomy. But it can be done and it can be done well, without diluting the quality or integrity of the science, if scientists construct a broader, more popular frame of reference for their research.

Science communicators are trained and experienced in this line of thinking and can help. Working together, we can make science more accessible and more highly valued by the people it informs and serves.