A little dated, but perhaps relevant to this dicussion is the Science
Museum Media Monitor project. Here, 6000 newspapers were sampled in a study
of newspaper trends (broadsheet and tabloid) from 1946 - 1990. A study of it
by Martin Bauer gave some interesting results:
. Over whole period, science coverage occupied around 5 percent of
total content
. Shift of emphasis from physical to biomedical/social sciences
. Repeating pattern of coverage for technologies of social importance
(nuclear, space, IT, biotech/genetic engineering, nanotech)
and a perhaps surprising result...
. Little difference in amount of coverage in quality/broadsheet papers
vs tabloids; slight difference in depth and tone
Maybe things have changed a bit since 1990, with the Guardian and
Telegraph in particular taking on more science coverage and employing
specialised science journos. Still, it does give some food for thought for
the anti-tabloid sci-comm snobs.
Glenn Murphy
The Science Museum, London
-----Original Message-----
From: Andy Lloyd [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Friday, September 16, 2005 11:20 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [PSCI-COM] Quality Newspapers and Popular Newspapers
I have often thought that the biggest professional challenge in our
sector would be to be science editor of the Sun (if such a post
existed), or maybe a similar position for Radio 1. If we believe we are
doing something important here, then we can never be too mainstream -
which means a different approach to the broadsheet/BBC2/Radio 4
audience. An interesting study (for someone more academic than I) would
be to see if it's possible to establish how much science communication
activity serves the same small audience. I have my suspicions. What do
others think?
Cheers
Andy
This e-mail and attachments are intended for the named addressee only and are confidential. If you have received this e-mail in error please notify the sender immediately, delete the message from your computer system and destroy any copies. Any views expressed in this message are those of the individual sender and may not reflect the views of the National Museum of Science & Industry. This email has been scanned for all viruses by the MessageLabs Email Security System.
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