Ideal Journalist

In my personal opinion, Mooney is correct in his article in saying that the increasing ‘cheapness’ of the media in finding many reporters, most of which have received little to no training in specific areas of coverage (ex. Science journalism), has lead to a great demise in the accuracy of reporting.  On one hand, we have journalists that acknowledge their lacking scientific knowledge, and compensate by covering several scientific opinions on an issue despite the lack of evidence for some certain opinions.  These journalists introduce unfounded opinions to the general public, and can create huge misinterpretations of studies and of the facts discovered from those studies in doing so.  On the other hand, there are journalists that do not acknowledge their lack of scientific knowledge and can easily be fooled into publishing a story that may come from a disreputable source or have questionable data backing their claim.  These can be equally, if not more damaging to the general public because of the lack of the presentation of other options, which would at least allow the scientifically literate community to decipher which studies are accurate.

It is through the study of both of these extremes that one cannot tell a journalist to either publish many ideas on the same topic nor to publish one opinion on the topic.  It seems that a reactionary action is necessary to revive science journalism to where Mooney indicated it had been during the ‘space race’.   It is NECESSARY to have trained scientific journalists that can use their own training and expertise to identify newsworthy stories, assess their reliability and to convey the scientific information from these studies in an accurate way.  This would eliminate a large portion of the misinformation out there on any vast array of topics.  If journalists publishing articles were held to the same standards that scientists were in publishing scientific papers, the media would be a much more useful tool, as opposed to a circus that will spin a story to benefit the interests of the highest bidder or publish an article with the facts of the news completely rearranged due to a lack of understanding.

            The scientist drawings that my friends and I made consist of a large white lab coat as most of the picture, with some accessory items such as a head, arms and legs sticking out of the giant coat.  All of the drawings had glasses and most had beards and crazy hair. 

            The illustrations of the scientists reflect a long-standing, media-created view of the scientist.  Let’s consider Dr. Frankenstein for a moment:

Crazy hair? Check.

Goggles/glasses? Check.

White lab coat? Check.

This view of scientists is an interesting consideration when deliberating how it affects the public’s trust in scientists and their conclusions.  The example of Dr. Frankenstein is a perfect example for this.  Examining not just his appearance, but his life story, one can see that he is eccentric, willing to go beyond the realm of appropriate behavior for his experiments (collecting body parts and whatnot), and cannot control his own creations.  Many of these characteristics are shared amongst scientists in movies and other media outlets. 

            Despite the overuse of these characteristics in many scientists in movies, many scientists I have met are not this way at all.  Throughout my time doing research from my freshman summer in high school, to my current research at Ursinus College, I have encountered quite a few scientists along my way.  One thing that I can say about most of the people that I meet in scientific fields is that they are extremely logical.  In order to perform experiments and to discover new things, one must be able to troubleshoot.  This requires a fair amount of logical thinking (eg. “given this, this and that… what could be the root of a problem in this experiment”).  This characteristic in scientists has allowed me to see scientists in their true light: as interesting AND interested people with the ability to solve problems (in science and in life) in an efficient and agreeable way and finally to see beyond (excuse my French) the bullshit and to interpret information as it is.  Perhaps if the media were a bit kinder to scientists, the public would have an easier time trusting them and trusting their findings.  Maybe one day instead of thinking scientists and seeing Dr. Frankenstein in our minds eye, we will see someone more like this:

Truthiness

As Stephen Colbert vaguely defines it, truthiness is the interpretation of the information you feel to be true as fact.  This is a vague definition, as are most definitions that involve “feeling” any type of emotion.  However, I most relate truthiness to a intuitive “gut” feeling that I get when interpreting a story that you have just read.   These intuitions usually come from preliminary data that you have collected from friends, political propaganda, parents, etc.  Lets say we have just read an article about red wine.  This particular article is in the most recent Food and Wine magazine and states that red wine is in no way, shape or form good for your cardiovascular health.  I would immediately look at this article with suspicion mostly due to the exceedingly large amounts of articles stating that red wine IS good for you, but also because I like red wine!  The fact that I like it and that I somehow feel just a bit more relaxed and healthy after two glasses at night makes me feel that perhaps this article is not giving us the whole “truthiness”, and nothing but the “truthiness”.

With respect to science writing, there is a fine line between incorporating truthiness amongst fact, and straight out lying.  Often times, a composite between hard fact and its relation to truthiness is the best answer to how scientific writing can best incorporate truthiness. If we were to say, for instance, that red wine is healthy for you due to the high levels of tannins in the grape skins, and to somehow relate this to how red wine makes you feel warm, it would give the audience something to relate back to their preliminary data (supposedly from drinking enough wine to feel warm).  This is perhaps the most effective way to incorporate “truthiness” into science writing.  Although I can definitely say that I hate the word “truthiness” both because it sounds bad, and because a gut feeling is never to be obeyed blindly without preliminary data, or new findings.  However, it does have some merit in terms of making dry science writing more effective and relatable.

How To Research

         One of the most influential parts of modern media outlets is the accessibility that it offers to both authors and consumers of news and media.  It is with this unrestricted access to produce or read anything that one can type into Google that comes the presence of limitless ungrounded theories.  The wealth and density of articles, opinions and scholarly papers online puts it in the hands of the consumer to search for, and interpret these articles without preliminary bias, and using scientific supporting evidence.  This is my reasoning for saying that promoters of the vaccine-autism link CAN, in fact, be labeled as scientifically illiterate or ignorant (based on the details of their research efforts). 

         For example, our search in class yesterday for ‘whether or not swimming on a full stomach can kill you’ was researched, one article was found, and it said that it could indeed kill you.  At this, the person guessing that celebrated that they were ‘right’ all along.  This example clearly shows that the person who guessed it to be true was starting their search with preliminary bias.  However, the rest can still be saved if you can be discerning about which articles to use as sources.  I’ve just found 3 articles that say that ‘eating before swimming can kill you’ is a myth, and three that support that statement. The rest is left up to searching for unbiased scientific data about the internal biological processes at work in metabolizing food, and in anaerobic exercise. 

         The tendency of people to believe the first “Cosmo” article that they find shows that they are researching their topic improperly.  Firstly, beginning with a preliminary bias in a search makes finding articles that support a vaccine-autism link much easier.  However, the indiscriminate use of articles without researching supporting scientific evidence can be just as damaging to the truth.

         For my grizzly article, I wrote about doctor’s reactions to the vaccine controversy currently going on.  Many doctors are calling for a government-backed project to support vaccine safety to increase the public’s trust in vaccines.  I have learned the same thing from individuals who readily accept Jenny McCarthy’s theories, which is that if you want something with scientific evidence to be realized by the general public, you still have to present the evidence in a flashy way.  Scholarly articles simply do not reach the public as effectively as those backed by large names. 

The News is the Priority

           The role and freedoms of journalists in the process of conveying news is a concern of mine that came up during a lecture given by a currently practicing journalist.  Many journalists have the idea that they can ask enough questions to understand the material well enough to write about it.  Although this is true to a certain degree, it is completely analogous to handing in a rough draft of an article without having the teacher check it for mistakes first.  Without an article being reviewed, are you not at risk of misrepresenting the news, and at the same time, misleading the public? I believe that there must be a system of checks and balances for journalists and the subjects of (and information within) their articles to ensure that the news is represented accurately.

            This brings me to the point I was beginning to make earlier.  While I understand that journalists are attempting to have an impact on the articles they are writing, it is important to understand that the news itself is the priority.  It is my personal belief that (scientific) journalists should not be able to submit an article written about someone else or their work without their review.  There should be an understanding that while their writing is a valuable part of the process, and, if good, can provide a link to their audience, the information in the article is not theirs to manipulate (intentionally or unintentionally).