6 Comparing the Literature of Science, Risk, and Environmental Communication Nichole Bennett, Won-ki Moon, John Besley, and Anthony Dudo Society's interest in science, risk, and the environment is reflected in the growth of three communication subfields over the last half-century: science communication, risk communi- cation, and environmental communication (Bubela et al., 2009). Numerous research articles, have been written and published within these subfields, and they are now established as major communication areas in both academia and practice. Although the history of science, risk, and environmental communication is not a short one, few have attempted to summarize the relationships between these fields. A literature mapping may help propel these three sub- fields forward (Gurabardhi, Gutteling, & Kuttschreuter, 2004). Specifically, an understand- ing of the extant research within and across these three fields allows us to better characterize both the current foci of these fields and how they have developed over time. This will allow us to examine whether there is considerable overlap (and perhaps redundancy) between the three bodies of work or whether there are gaps between the three bodies of work yet to be explored (Pleasant, Good, Shanahan, & Cohen, 2002). This mapping will provide a founds. tion upon which to build future work, ‘To this aim, we begin the work of mapping the relationship between these three fields by analyzing abstracts of published papers. From a practical view, the fields of science, risk, and ‘environmental communication share a similar goal: helping people make better decisions in their lives (Fischhoff, 2013) through communication aimed at shaping what people believe and feel, as well as how they frame issues (Besley, Dudo, & Yuan, 2018). These three fields operate at the boundary between specialized sciences and the general public(s) (Kahan, 2013), and high- light to the public how science can serve as an important tool for making informed decisions con major issues as well as making sense of the world around us (Davis et al., 2018; Hansen, 2015; Scheufele, 2014), This often requires working within entangled epistemologies, translating difficult-to-understand, abstract, and sometimes controversial content (Lester, 2015; Weigold, 2001). DOL: 10.4324/9780367275205-8COMPARING THE LITERATURE 83 In contrast, these fields are distinctive in terms of the specific strategies of communicat- jag practices (Burns, O'Connor, & Stocklmayer, 2003). Risk and environmental communica tion, for example, tend to emphasize a call to action from society as an essential part of their _ esearch (Gurebardhi, Gutteling, & Kuttschreuter, 2004). Environmental communication has teen described as a “crisis discipline” because the environmental topics and public interaction with them are viewed as crises (Cox, 2007). This ean mean that environmental communica- tion can sometimes take on an advocacy position and aim to persuade the public to engage in | gocial-environmental change (Davis et al., 2018; Hansen, 2011; Milstein, 2009). In contrast, the subfield of science communication often centers on citizens’ engagement with science debates, understanding of scientific ideas, and appreciation of scientific culture and is marked jess by calls to action or crisis communication and more by evidence-based communication - (avis et al,, 2018). However, there is no clear agreement on where the borders of these three fields are drawn. n the one hand, these subfields may be victims of how siloed academic disciplines often are | (Lindenfeld ct al., 2012), but on the other they deal with issues that often overlap and span across - porders of the other subfields (Nisbet & Scheufele, 2009), For instance, in early stages, risk ~ communication is very similar to science communication because risk communication is often practiced by scientists or experts, who generally foresee the risk much earlier than other parts ‘of society (Irwin, 2008). In this case, risk communication practices may embrace approaches to science communication or vice versa. Also, ifthe risk is related to the environment, itis both risk and environmental communication. For example, climate change is a science, risk, and environmental issue simultaneously. Climate change papers can be easily found in journals of science, risk, and environmental com- munication (Moser, 2010). Although the borders between these fields often blur, the three fields also have their own traditions and trends. In the example of climate change, research in science communication may focus more on public understanding of climate change or communication ‘raining for scientists, while risk journals might publish more papers about risk perceptions and policy support. Davis et al. found environmental topics in 30% and 27% of journal articles pub- lished between 2014 and 2017 in Science Communication and Public Understanding of Science, respectively; just over 60% of these papers were on climate change (2018). They also found a - double-asymmetry; while science communication studies included more topics from environ- ‘mental communication studies, the field of environmental communication did more referencing of science communication theories and articles (Davis et al, 2018). ‘The three subfields share many similarities in their historical trajectories, with some distinc- tions, Within the last 30 years, defining organizational and institutional features, like special- ist peer-reviewed journals, professional networks and organizations, and university programs, have all signaled the establishment of these three subfields (Anderson, 2015; Cox, 2013; Cox & Depoe, 2015; Trench, 2012). However, Davis et al. remark that a key difference between the otigins of science communication and environmental communication lies in how environmental Communication developed as a critique of systems (including seience and technology) that are harmful to the environment, while science communication was founded around surveys of public scientific literacy and strategies of science popularization (2018). That is, environmental com- ‘munication has more history of being value-laden and in critical relationship to dominant power structures than science communication or risk communication (Davis et al., 2018), However, science communication’s shift to a seience-in-society focus, as well as its increased attention to enviroumental issues may mean that this is shifting (Davis et al., 2018; Scheufele, 2014). Risk90 NICHOLE BENNETT ETAL. communication, likewise, has a history of introspection into its subjectivity and values (Slovie, 1987). However, in recent years, environmental communication may also be moving away from a place of pure advocacy to embracing science communication and risk communicetion’s foun, dations of public sense-making and informed decision making (Cox, 2007; Hansen, 2015). In this chapter, we investigate the relationships between these three fields rather than defin. ing the fringe of each field. In this, we tried to draw a map, describing the relationships among science, risk, and environmental communication to help practitioners and researchers better understand both areas of overlap and divergence. We do this by analyzing the abstracts of pub. lished research in science, risk, and environmental communication journals and try to capture {important patterns and other potential insights. We specifically attempted to find the relationships between subfields by comparing authors, keywords, methods, and topics. RESEARCH QUESTIONS The objectives of this chapter are primarily exploratory, and our hope is to help generate ques- tions for future work, not to provide definitive answers. ‘We are especially interested in how much overlap (versus distinction) is there between the three subfields of science communication, environmental communication, and risk communi- cation. We will first examine this by looking at how much author overlap is there between the topics. ‘That is, how many authors have published in more than one of these areas? If the fields have a high proportion of authors in common with one another, this might suggest that the fields are quite fluid and overlap quite a bit, Ifthe authorship has a low overlap between the topics, this ‘might suggest that these fields are more separated. RI: How much author overlap is there between the topics? ‘We are also interested in which methods are used in these fields. We will search for a list of methods in the abstracts and break it down by year and by topic. This will help us examine the overall use of different methodologies in the research area as a whole, inves- tigate trends in use over recent years, and compare the relative use of different methods between the three topies. R2: What methods are more frequently mentioned in abstracts (by year, by topic)? : We will also examine the explicit mention of specific theories in these fields using alist of common theories for the field. We are interested in whether a theory is commonly invoked in article abstracts in the field, A failure to mention the theory in the abstract could suggest that the research is atheoretical. We will also explore whether there are any trends in the mention cof theory over time and compare and contrast the mention of theory in the three topic areas. R3: What theories are more frequently mentioned in abstracts (by year, by topig)?” We are also interested in which scientific and technological topics are mentioned in abstracts (e.g. “climate change”). Are certain topics covered more than other topics in these three communication research areas? Are there trends in how these topics are mentioned over time? We will also compare abstract topic mention trends to Google Search Trends to further investigate whether what we are studying matches or contrasts with Google users’ search patterns. We will also compare actos topics to explore if certain scientific and - technological issues are covered more in science, risk, or environmental communication. Ra: What scientific/tech topics are more frequently mentioned in abstracts (by year, by topic)? Recent years have found increasing and more vocal support for diversity, equity, and | inclusion efforts in STEM spaces (Dawson, 2019). We used a list of terms related 10 |h fora help us inyes- ethods list of sked in est that COMPARING THE LITERATURE 91 _giversty, equity, and inclusion and searched for mentions in abstracts. Is increased inter- ‘arin these topies matched by parallel increases in research interest in science, risk, and - jnvironmental communication over recent years? If so, are certain aspects covered more = Shen than others? Do studies in certain topic areas (science, risk, environment) include ~ frentions of diversity, equity, and inclusion topics more often? “gs: How often are social justice, diversity, equity, inclusion topies mentioned in abstracts © fb year, By topic)? METHODS sample is an attempted census and contains 3,125 total articles spanning from the dates 1986 3018 downloaded from the Web of Science Database, We then filtered the dataset to contain only files from the year 2000 onward. This was to ensure that each year had at least 25 articles. For hh unit of analysis, the downloaded sample typically contained the first and second authors, title, , abstract, and joumal name of the article. Some of the earlier articles do not have an abstract. journals Public Understanding of Science and Science Communication were grouped under “Science Communication” topic. All articles from the relevant time period were downloaded m these journals. The journals Risk Analysis and Journal of Risk Research were grouped under “Risk Communication” topic. Only joumal articles using the keyword “communication” were jwnfoaded from the risk journals because these journals are mul inary in nature. The yurnal Environmental Communication—A Journal of Nature and Culture was grouped under the _ “Environment Communication” topic. All articles were downloaded. Our sample contains 1,157 articles from Public Understanding of Science, 771 articles from Science Communication, 457 Communication” topic, and 460 under the “Environmental Communication” topic. ANALYSES: ‘We used the text of abstracts as a proxy for the entire text of the article, and acknowledged the limitations of this strategy. Using customized Python scripts using the nltk, pandas, and re librar- ies, we preprocessed the Endnote plain text file. We first parsed the large bibliographic Endnote - text file into a pandas dataframe using regular expression mapping, For the first research question (RQI), we used a customized Python script to look for overlap in authorship among the topics. ‘To develop the word search lists for the deductive research questions (R2-R4), we started ith a group-generated list from our research team members and then categorized the list by each esearch question (methods, theories, topics, and diversity/equity inclusion). We also looked for ‘elevant keywords in the list of most used words in each of these topic areas, We then developed Inferential statistics, including formal hypothesis tests, are not used because the analyses are based on a census of the available content,92 NICHOLE BENNETT ETAL. Frequency research understand knowledg effect scientist exami technolog discuss develop partici ‘model Figure 6.1 RESULTS Summary Statistics After preprocessing the sample journal abstracts in nltk by removing stopwords, tokenization, stemming, and lemmatization, we created frequency distributions for the 30 most frequently occurring words in abstracts for the overall sample (Figure 6.1), for science communication (Figure 6.2), for environmental communication (Figure 6.3), and for risk communication (Figure 6.4), Overall, the word “tisk” seems to dominate across the subfields in word counts in the journal abstracts. [tis followed by “public,” “seienc,” “communi,” and “studi.” We also created frequency distributions for the top 30 first authors for articles in the overall sample (Figure 6.5), for science communication (Figure 6.6), for environmental communication (Figure 6.7), and for risk communication (Figure 6.8) RESEARCH QUESTIONS RI: How much author overlap is there between the topics? ‘One approach to investigate overlap between the three topics (science communication, risk com- ‘munication, and environmental communication) is to examine overlap in the authorship of jour- nal articles for the three topics. Using a Python script on the processed text sample file, we used the pandas library to investigate which authors had published in multiple topics, We used the first author only in this analysis.COMPARING THE LITERATURE 93 Figure 6.2 zation, ently cation cation in the reated @ 6.5), nd fot environment Figure 6.3 ‘We found that there was not much overlap in authorship in the three areas, suggesting that __ the topics may be relatively siloed (Figure 6.9). There were 1,623 total first authors of arti- | eles in our sample. There were 160 authors that had publications in two or more of the topic ‘com -_ Ateas, Seventy-four first authors in the sample have published in both risk communication fjour- ~ and science communication. Ten first authors have published in both environmental com- cused | we first ‘mental communication and science communication, Eleven first authors have published in | allthree topic areas,94 NICHOLE BENNETT ET AL. Figure 6.4 Number of eles Overall, there does not appear to be a high amount of overlap between the first authorship between the fields. Its interesting to note that fewer first authors share overlap between the three fields and between environsaental communication and risk communication. This may be because science communication serves as an umbrella over the other two fields. Or it may also be because risk communication and environmental communication in these particular journals do not seem to have the same overlap in research publication as science communication has with either of these two fields. This may be also an artifact of there being more science communication articles than the other two topies (62% of the articles were from seience communication; 23% from risk communication; and 15% from environmental communication). R2: What methods are more frequently mentioned in abstracts (by year, by topic)? Using our word list of social science methods, we searched and counted how frequently they appeared at least once in the journal article abstracts collected for science communication, risk95 yoadeony yowreziey Sfoysr ue "erH sep/eno4s exo session ena Saysc0yssnechia COMPARING THE LITERATURE 5 De 2. 3 3 26 wou zg 2° en § as sit 2 a 2 ‘oi Bee sen ra) 2a Uesutor lussusr yas 30 20 0 2» smu 79 JeqUMN ‘sep jo eq30N)g 2 S — € £ 5 2 uo wesuor sopomy yo sequenCOMPARING THE LITERATURE 97 028 — survey vs Interview S experiment = qualitative’ 5 — review + case study 3 contortanalyss 5 + quanttaive oom focus group 4 lengua 2 == network analysis 3 =» motaanalysis § time series a phenomenological é ‘ethnography big data Figure 6.10 survey I Scene Commonenin tenon 2 Pk conmuaton expetinent EndrermertCommenatin arta ‘case study) eon cquattatne content enaiyss focus grup longitudinal pote anayis enorrenctogtal 2 aanadis tine soves i data etnoorap| 000 098 010 01s. 020 025 Proportion of Article Abstracts Containing Figure 6.11 Communication, and environmental communication. Using a Python script custom-written for this task, we examined the proportional use of the terms over time and between topics. We Searched for the terms “survey”, “longitudinal”, “interview”, “focus group”, “experiment”, -fontent analysis”, “ethnography”, “qualitative*”, “quantitative”, “meta-analysis”, “grounded theory”, “phenomenological”, “case study”, “big data”, “time series”, “network analysis”, and “Teview". “Grounded theory” was not found in the abstracts, so this phrase was removed from the final charts. The following figures display the relative proportion of abstracts containing that ‘Word at least once over time (Figure 6.10) and between topies (Figure 6.11). A y-axis value ofNICHOLE BENNETT ET AL, Table 6.1 Total word counts of method mentions in abstracts in articles trom Pty Understancing of Scionce, Scenes Communication, Risk Analysis, Journal of ° esearch, and Environmental Communicatton—A Journal of Nature and Cuts (2000-2018) ‘Term searched Science Riskcommunication —— Enviranmantat communication communication Survey 209 135 a Interview @ 2% Experiment oa 83 20 qualitative? 8 38 6 Review 59 36 R cease study 2 30 content analysis 0 2 Quantitative a4 33 focus group 41 9 Longitudinal network analysis meta-analysis pheriomenological time series big data Ethnography “I” would mean that word showed up in every single abstract of that year or that topic at leat once. A y-axis value of “0” would mean that word did not show up in that year or that topic. Ti tables on the following pages display the total word counts for each topic and overall over th years 2000-2018 (Table 6.1). ‘The words “survey”, “interview”, and “experiment” show up most commonly in abstract time period, suggesting that these are methods commonly employed in these fields. There! are not any clear trends of methodological use over time suggested by the word use in abstracts Between topics, it seems that “survey” shows up relatively more often than other methods fo science communication and risk communication but not for environmental communication. Ris communication abstracts contained relatively more use of “experiment” than the other two field The most commonly mentioned method in environmental communication was “interview”, bat ‘was present in similar proportions in the other two topics as well. This analysis is meant to be primarily exploratory, but it does suggest future methodologies opportunities for these three subfields, These three subfields appear to share many methodo logical approaches, so there also seem to be opportunities for more collaboration between the subfields than the authorship analysis suggests. Further, methods that complement the predomi nantly survey-driven methods (e.g. qualitative and mixed methods) may enrich our understand ing of the big questions these three fields ask.COMPARING THE LITERATURE 99 — knowledge gap planned behavior == cultivation + heuristc-systematic — reasoned action ‘congruence ~ agenda setting == multipicity social learning elaboration lkeltnood influence of presumed uncertainty management health beliet protective action decision technology acceptance PRISM isk information processing 2 8 Containing, Proportion of Article Abstracts 8 0.018 ‘R3: What theories are more frequently mentioned in abstracts (by year, by topic)? ‘To investigate the use of theory and frameworks in these three topic areas (science communica- tion, risk communication, and environmental communication), we searched the abstract text for a select list of terms related to social science theories. Using a Python script custom written for this task, we examined the proportional use of the terms over time and between topics. We searched for the terms “framing”, “agenda setting”, “social learning”, “cultivation”, “constructivism”, least: = “heuristio-systematic”, “knowledge gap”, “planned behavior”, “self-determination”, “influence . The _ofpresumed media influence”, “technology acceptance”, “elaboration likelihood”, “congruence”, er the “reasoned action”, “LC4MP”, “psychoanalytic”, “Pavlovian”, “Hofstede’s cultural dimensions”, “multiplicity”, “uncertainty management”, “PRISM”, “protective action decision”, “risk infor- tracts | mation processing”, “health belief”, and “stages of change”. The following words were not found There. [inthe abstracts so they were removed from the following tables and charts; “Hofstede’s cultural racts. [= dimension”, “LC4MP”, “Pavlovian”, “constructivism”, “psychoanalytic”, “self-determination”, is for ‘or “stages of change”. The following figures display the relative proportion of abstracts contain- Risk ing that word at least once over time (Figure 6.12) and between topics (Figure 6.14). The word jelds. “framing” showed up in such a higher frequeney than any other word that we moved it to its own. bat it figures by year (Figure 6.13) and by topic (Figure 6.15) fo avoid flattening all ofthe other values nthe chart, A y-axis value of “1” would mean that word showed up in every single abstract of gical that year or that topic at least once. A y-axis value of “0” would mean that word did not show up rodo- in that year or that topic, The tables on the following pages display the total word counts for each n the _ topic and overall over the years 2000-2018 (Table 6.2). lomi- Framing was the most common theoretical framework on the list of terms we searched for tand- In abstracts, by far. And because we searched for “framing” and not “fram*”, our word counts __ likely underestimate the true mentions of framing. While there were more than 153 mentionsNICHOLE BENNETT ETAL, Proportion of Articles Containing roe eo Pama abe Caan Hausen Peace sto ‘ceeenee aera ateay Pabartn tod hoy at bt ‘egy copnce| ikinswraten reso Pasi 0000 Year Figure 6.13 Source Commrcaten BE Pee Cormteason Enviar Conmarins 080 Preprton of rls Canin Figure 6,COMPARING THE LITERATURE 101 Environmental ‘Communication 0.000 0.025 0.050 0.075 0.100 3 Proportion of Articles Containing "Framing? Figure 6.15 Table 6.2 Total word counts of theory mentions in abstracts in articles trom Public Understanding of Science, Science Communication, Risk Analysis, Journal of Risk Research, {and Environmental Communication—A Journal of Nature and Culture (2000-2018) Term searched Science Risk Environmental — Total ‘communication communication _commaication Framing 85 18 50 153 10 7 6 6 5 5 4 3 2 2 owledge gap Cultivation bearstie-systematio planned behavior agenda setting reasoned action Congraence protective action decision claboration likelihood health belief influence of presumed media : infuence ‘Multiplicity ‘uncertainty management PRISM, risk information processing. social learning, techmology aeveptance402 NICHOLE BENNETT ET AL. of framing, the next highest mentioned theory (knowledge gap) was only mentioned tenting in 2000-2018 in abstracts. This large gap shows that framing may be a favored theory in jy ‘area, Other than framing, however, there were not many mentions of the other theories on «, tis search list. This suggests a lack of theoretical frameworks in these papers—as interpreted fy, abstracts—and suggests an opportunity to connect theory to research in these three topic arcay 4: What scientificitech topics are more frequently mentioned in abstracts (by year, by top), After looking at methodological terms and theory terms in the abstracts over time and overtop we then searched for specific science issues to explore how they are mentioned in abstract, We searched for the terms “biotech*”, “agriculture”, “nanotech”, “gmo* | genetically ac fied | genetically modified | genetic engineer*”, “synthetic bio*”, “climate change”, “e “nuclear, “vacein#™, “renewable energy |solar| wind | hydro”, “upeyeting | dovmeyeling | tree cling”, “pollution”, “self-driving | autonomous vehicle”, and “artificial intelligence”. The fo, Towing terms were not found in the abstracts so they are removed from subsequent charts ang tables: “crispr”, “self-driving | autonomous vehicle”, “upeyeling | downeycling | recycling”. The following figures display the relative proportion of abstracts containing that word at least once over time (Figure 6.16) and between topics (Figure 6.17). A y-axis value of “I” would mean that word showed up in every single abstract of that year or that topic at least once. A y-axis Value cof “0” would mean that word did not show up in that year or that topic. The tables on the fol. ‘owing pages display the total word counts for each topic and overall over the years 2000-2013 (Table 6.3) Climate change was by far the most discussed topic in the abstracts, with a clear upward trend throughout the time period (2000-2018). Before 2007, biotech was present in more abstracts than climate change, but this term experienced a gradual decrease throughout the time period. This — climate change biotech" =--~ amo" I gonetically modified | genetically mods [genet engineer + nanotech nuclear renewable energy | solar| wind] hydro veccin’ pollution agricuture synthetic bio” artificial intoligence Proportion of Artcle Abstracts Containing Figure 6.16COMPARING THE LITERATURE — 103 Science Communication 1B bk Communicaen Eine Commarication imate change wie - [gonetcaly mosiied| gonetaly meea| reanctech soniear renewable eneigy [solr wind | yo pobaton agree syntatietiot antl neigence 00 o4 02 | | | | | | as rogertin ot Aricies Contning Figure 6.17 Table 6.3 Total word counts of topic mentions in abstracts in articies from Public Understanding ‘of Science, Science Communication, Risk Analysis, Journal of Risk Research, and Environmental ‘Communication—A Joumal of Nature and Culture (2000-2018) Science Risk Environmental ‘Total communication communication communication climate change Mm 38 nT 266 _ go" | genetically-modified | 4a 28 3 2 sgenstcaly modified| genetic - engineer? biotech 69 6 1 6 uclear 2 3 2 6s nanotech? $5 7 1 6 renewable energy | solar| “4 2 20 6 ‘wind | hydro ~ pollution 10 2 5 r vaccin® 9 10 0 9 agriculture 7 1 5 B ‘syathetio bio 10 1 nw ‘atiticial intelligence 1 0 1 _ tay be due to the terminology changing to “genetic engineering” or “genetic modification”. _ Whea we look at how the topics are mentioned, climate change takes up a higher proportion of mentions in risk communication and environmental communication, While it has high word - Counts in science communication, it occupies a lower proportion of total abstracts. © To explore how the issues mentioned in these abstracts might compare to what the wider | Public might be interested in, we compared the terms searched for in abstracts to Google Trends for those same terms. Google ‘Trends data shows how frequently a given search term is entered104 NICHOLE BENNETT ETAL. into Google’s search engine relative to the site’s total search volume over a given period of ting ‘We entered the science issue terms as keyword search terms in Google ‘Trends for the Unite, States, downloaded the.csy file, imported the data into Python, and aggregated the data by ye (averaging) using the pandas library of Python. We then used Python to plot a year-to-year com, parison of how these ferms show up in these journal abstracts versus what people are searchin for on the Google search engine. The terms that Google Trends did not have enough data for (q, ‘enough ratio of search volume) were “renewable energy | solar | wind | hydro*”, “self-criving autonomous vehicle”, “upeycling | downeycling | recycling”, and “synthetic bio*”, The top charts are the word count data; the bottom charts are the Google Trends da (Figures 6.18-6.21). The y-axis of the top charts is as before: the relative proportion of abs containing that word at least one for that year in all three topics. A y-axis value of “1” wou ‘mean that word showed up in every single abstract of that year or that topic at least once. A y-ayi 048 100. + artical intelligence (Googie Trends) — attitcial inteligence (abstracts biotech (Google Trends} ‘= biotech (abstracts) rnanotech (Google Trends) -— nanotech (abstracts) synthetic bio (Google Trends} ‘synthetic bio (abstracts) Proportion of Abstracts Containing Google Trends Relative Search Interest poo 2012 20142016 Year = 9 2018 Figure 6.18 yenotic engineering (Google Trends) | — genetic enginosting (abstracts) biotech (Google Trends) ‘75 —biotach (abstracts) vip (Google Trends) — etpse (abstracts) 50. gmo (Google Trends) ‘gmo (abstracts) ‘genetically mocitied (Google Trends) 25 genetically mociied (abstracts) 05 Proportion of Abstracts Containing 00 —— ° 2004 2008 2008 2010 2012 2014 2018 2018 Yoar Figure 6.19COMPARING THE LITERATURE 105 “vaccine (Ganzi Tons) = vaccino fberacte) Google Trends Relarive Search Interest 0 Bor 2008 2000 F010 2012 2014 2018 2018 Year Figure 6.20 +++-climate change (Google Trends) — climate change (abstracts) pollution (Google Trends) -—~ pollution (abstracts) ‘nuclear (Google Trends) ‘nuclear (abstracts) m eee i = i 8 i ; i = = ° 2004 2008 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018, Year Figure 6.21 of “0” would mean that word did not show up in that year or that topic. Google Trends data only available from 2004 onward, so the abstract word count data is truncated for comparison. te y-axis of the Google Trends data (bottom charts) displays the search interest relative to the Highest point on the chart for the given region and time. A value of 100 is the peak popularity for ‘erm. A value of 50 means that the term is half as popular. A score of 0 means that Google Inot have enough data (user searches) for that term. __ Although these comparisons are exploratory and reffect relative and proxy measures for ch interest versus public interest, they still provide insight into some interesting pattems, re the’trends match, it suggests that research agendas and public agendas are relatively ed (even if the details of the interest may be different for the different groups). Where the106 NICHOLE BENNETT ET AL, trends do not match, a mismatch between interests in the two groups is suggested. For exam. ple, Figure 6.18 suggests that people searched Google increasingly about genetically modi. fied organisms, but there was not a concomitant rise in relative rescarch interest in the sample journal abstracts. The opposite situation may be happening with the term “climate change” jn Figure 6.21; research interest is on the rise without a parallel surge in the relative public interest, This topic may be top of mind for researchers but not be a priority for the public. In Figure 6.19, a sharp spike in interest in vaccines in 2009 likely reflects the KINI flu pandemic, demonstrating how both research and public interest may echo public events. The same situation may be hap. pening in Figure 6.21 when there is a small bump in rescarch and Google search interest in the term “nuclear” after the March 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster. RS: How often are social justice, diversity, equity, inclusion topics mentioned in abstracts (by year, by topic)? “To investigate how often these abstracts mention topics of diversity, equity, and inclusion, we searched the abstracts for the following terms: “diversity”, “equality | inequality”, “inclusion { exclusion”, “accesib" | inaccesib*”, “social justice”, “inequity | equity”, “racis*”, “sexist, “homophobi*”, “hetereonormativ*”, and “ableis*”. The terms “abelis*™, “hetereonormativ'™, “homophobi*”, and “sexis*” did not occur in the sample abstracts. The following figures display the relative proportion of abstracts containing that word at least once over time (Figure 6.22) and | between topics (Figure 6.23). A y-axis value of “1” would mean that word showed up in every single abstract of that year or that topic at least once. A y-axis value of“0” would mean that word didnot show up in that year or that topic. The table on the following page displays the total word counts for cach topic and overall over the years 2000-2018 (Table 6.4). ‘Overall, these terms do not seem to appear in high proportion of the abstracts. Diversity appears the most, followed by racis* and inclusion | exclusion. Low mentions of these terms in relation to communication practices for science, risk, and environmental fields are troubling, The slightly higher mentioning of “diversity” is interesting, but future research should explore — diversity sees racis! — = Inclusion | exclusion =~ social justice equality | inequality = agcessib* | Inaccessio* ces inequity | equity Proportion of Article Abstracts Containing Figure 6.22COMPARING THE LITERATURE 107 Wi Science Communication BE Risk Communication ist Environmental vat ‘Gommurication Indusion | excusion ‘equality | equality cassio" | Inaccesso* = recuiyLesaty | | | | | o 0.000 00051 mts one on, we lusion Proportion of Arte Abstracts Contaling exis 7 Figure 6.23 Table 6.4 Total word counts of topic mentions in abstracts in artioles from Public ‘Understanding of Science, Science Communication, Risk Analysis, Journal of Risk Research, oe and Emiwonmentl Communication A Joutnal of Nature and Culture (2000-2018) we | word, Temvwarhed Seen Tish ‘mironmetal ‘Total communicaton _commicaton communication rersity diversity 30 9 5 4 terms bing ris? 8 3 M 2 clone inclusion extsion 4 8 5 2 cali nesuaticy 3 0 1 4 ‘inequity | equity 1 1 1 3 sccesb[incessib¢ 2 0 0 2 on ‘whether “low-hanging fruit” of optical allyship and tokenism come at the expense of more trans- formative, inclusive communication research and practice (Dawson, 2019). It is worth thinking ' _about how these terms (and what they represent) entwine with multiple aspects of science com- ‘TMunication, risk communication, and environmental communication, and opportunities exist to integrate them more fully in our research. DISCUSSION Although the quantity of research in the three subfields of science communication, risk com- | Munication, and environmental communication has rapidly increased, few studies have stopped to take stock and summarize and map these three subfields. Our efforts here begin to map the ~ Subfields by analyzing abstracts from prestigious journals in these subfields. This analysis is pree ‘Himinary at best and begins to outline overlaps and distinctions between these three subfields, as ‘Well as gaps and opportunities for future research within each,408 = NICHOLE BENNETTET AL. Little overlap was found between first authors among the subfields. There was some over), between first authors shared by two or more subfields, but these publications represented aroun 10% of the overall sample, This suggests some overlap of research style, theoretical approaches and academic culture, but that overall, each subfield may have its own traditions and relatively siloed research groups. These three subfields may be better served by closer cooperation, and collaborations aroung common issues would connect key findings from one subfield to another. Points of divergences among the subfields may also be useful for collaboration and creative friction. For example, a5 the subfield of science communication tackles more politicized topics, learning from environ. ‘mental communication’s transparency about being value-laden and advocating for persuasion’ may prove useful (Davis et al., 2018). This may become increasingly important as scientific issues (e.g. climate change, vaccines, and GMOs) receive more societal and political attention and the authority of science and interpretation of its findings are challenged in the public arena a, the philosophical level in an increasingly “post-truth” world (Scheufele, 2013). ‘When we searched for terms associated with methods, we found evidence that all three sub. | fields depend heavily on survey, interview, and experimental research methods. While science com. munication and risk communication used these three methods at much higher frequencies than the other terms we searched, studies in environmental communication more evenly employed a variety of research methods from the word list. ‘The rise of digital media likely beckons researchers in | these three subfields to employ more diverse research methods for new data forms, such as network analysis or time series analysis, The low incidence of the word “meta-analysis” also suggests that more summaties of published research would benefit these three subfields. Our searches of terms associated with communication theories suggested that studies of framing dominate all three subfields, especially within environmental communication studies, This dominance may refiect the controversy surrounding the concepts and uses of framing in climate change (Brulle, 2010; Lakoff, 2010). After framing theory, no other theories showed up in high proportions of the studies, but all three subfields included mention of “knowledge gap” There was slight overlap in theory use between the subfields, perhaps reflecting the asymmetric flow of evidence-based theory from science communication to other subfields found by other studies (Davis et al., 2018). Otherwise, the subfields were divided on favored theories. Risk ” communication studies included mentions of persuasive and strategic communication theories. Science communication and environmental studies included mentions of classical media effect theories, such as agenda setting, multiplicity, and planned behavior, Risk communication also included more mentions of information processing theories, while science communication and 3 environmental communication included more mentions of theories concerning the flow of infor- mation, However, overall, these theories showed up in a tiny proportion of the sample abstract, suggesting that these studies lack substantial theoretical frameworks. Perhaps this is due to the practical character of these three subfields. These results, while preliminary and proxy, invite researchers in these subfields to incorporate more theoretical structure into their work. ‘When we look at mentions of research topics in these three subfields, “climate change” was a clear favorite research issue in the three subfields, especially in recent years. Climate change, | as a topic, spans all three subfields, but showed up more in environmental communication journal abstracts. Environmental communication’s perceived status as a “crisis” discipline may explait greater interest in topics, especially climate change (Cox, 2007). However, scholars have called upon science communication researchers to move beyond science-focused activities to issues focused work (Nisbet, 2017), so we may experience changes in these trends in the future. Ft the subfields of risk communication and science communication, the topics conceming geneti¢ engineering were relatively popular. For the subfield of risk communication, there was mortCOMPARING THE LITERATURE — 109 jn topics conceming energy. Science communication abstracts contained some mentions “panotecbnology. Compared to energy and genetic engineering, vaccines and artificial intel- ace were covered in fewer studies. Inthe future, we may expect more coverage of these and ‘emerging technological and scientific issues (e.g, pandemic diseases such as COVID-19, jc engineering with CRISPR-cas9, and artificial intelligence) as these issues increasingly ‘et with society. Our relative comparison of Google Trends search data to the coverage in ‘sample articles suggests that the public’s interest (as measured by search engine interest) gy not always correspond to academic interest. Asking the question of what leads to these dis ies (funding trends, agenda setting by media, framing effects on popular opinion, ete.) will jeip us better understand the interplay between popular and expert sources as well as ensure that Foal topics are covered in research. “When we searched for terms associated with diversity, equity, and inclusion, we found very Je mention of them in these three subfields. Of the terms we searched, “diversity” showed up ‘most in the three subfields, but this was still at low proportions. Relatively speaking (and ill at low proportions), the subfield of environmental communication seems to include more “jiscussion of racism and social justice than the other two subfields. This may be in recognition © ofthe effects of environmental justice issues in this subfield and agrees with environmental com- fiunication scholars who claim that the subfield was bom out of critique of science and with an enéss of systems of power and oppression (Davis et al., 2018). In this, science communica- and risk communication may benefit from environmental communication’s transparency _ghout values and commitment to advocacy. ‘As these three subficlds move toward more human-centered forms of communication (and y from deficit models), we hope and expect topics of diversity, equity, and inclusion toreceive = miore attention (Johnson, 1999). Many issues covered by these subfields, such as climate change ‘or pandemics, have a social dimension to them that requires a more thorough look at how equity = intersects with communicating these topics. Some have suggested that these communication sub- = fields may be best positioned to support scientists in moving beyond perceptions of science as a _‘monolith and as value-free in promoting a more just world (Ottinger, 2015). CONCLUSION Rather than providing answers, this chapter generates many questions about these three subfields. _ ‘The rapid expansion of these three subfields in both quality and quantity requires concomitant care with reviewing and mapping these three subfields. Our findings here suggest that these three _ subfields are sensitive to the needs of the real world. This strength would be well matched by incorporating more theoretical rigor into all three subfields. 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