Gill Margaret J
Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, North Central College, Naperville, IL 60540.
J Undergrad Neurosci Educ. 2023 Dec 17;22(1):A14-A21. doi: 10.59390/KCBV9244. eCollection 2023 Fall.
Scientific communication has become more important than ever before, yet most scientists are not trained in how to communicate their research findings to the general public. The PopScience assignment is a semester-long writing and oral communication project that focuses on how to communicate primary scientific literature to the general public. The overall goals of the PopScience project are to teach students how to: 1) critically evaluate neuroscience primary literature, and 2) translate and convey primary literature findings to a lay audience. Students completed a pre- and post- assignment perceptive assessment to evaluate the skills they obtained (e.g., reading comprehension and critical thinking), and the effectiveness of the assignment in improving these skills. Students reported that overall, the assignment improved their ability to read primary literature articles and explain them to a lay audience. Self-evaluation and professor assessments suggest the PopScience assignment also improved student's ability to integrate and summarize results from multiple sources, as well as identify and explain neuroscience terminology that often leads to confusion for lay audiences. In conclusion, this assignment teaches students how to communicate basic neuroscience to the general public, a skill that continues to be critical in successful scientific careers.
科学交流比以往任何时候都更加重要，但大多数科学家并未接受过如何向普通大众传达其研究成果的培训。大众科学作业是一个为期一学期的写作和口头交流项目，重点在于如何向普通大众传达基础科学文献。大众科学项目的总体目标是教导学生如何：1）批判性地评估神经科学基础文献，以及2）将基础文献的研究结果翻译并传达给普通受众。学生完成了作业前后的感知评估，以评估他们所获得的技能（例如阅读理解和批判性思维），以及该作业在提高这些技能方面的有效性。学生报告称，总体而言，该作业提高了他们阅读基础文献文章并向普通受众解释这些文章的能力。自我评估和教授评估表明，大众科学作业还提高了学生整合和总结来自多个来源的结果的能力，以及识别和解释那些常常让普通受众感到困惑的神经科学术语的能力。总之，这项作业教导学生如何向普通大众传达基础神经科学知识，这一技能在成功的科学职业生涯中仍然至关重要。
