Science communication is an emerging area of practice and research. It is the exchange of scientific research findings, exchange of scientific facts and figures to either scientist or non-scientific audience.
Science Communication is the practice of proper skills, media activities, discussion to generate at least one of the accompanying individual reactions to science (the AEIOU vowel relationship) Awareness, Enjoyment, Interest, Opinion-Forming, and Understanding. It gives the better understanding of the consequences of scientific research and development for society. It can help us to harness the economic benefits for individuals as well as for the societies. It has been also noted that it could be problematic when journalist write stories for science despite having good links with scientist or engineers.
Communicating science, public understanding of science and technology, science popularization and science journalism are interchangeably terms to science communication and has advanced in the past two to three decades. Science media messages had a great concern of communication scholars but less attention is given to science, in almost every media house in comparison to other beats like politics, business, sports, or even entertainment.
If we talk about the nineteenth century, media houses valued science. In newspaper like New York Tribune, lectures of different scientists were published. During the time period of Second World War, science reporting reaches at its top. It is the time when science and technology is considered essential to win the game.
Now days in news media considered science as a niche so in the big media houses science is covered by the beat correspondents where as in small news media science news is dealt by routine task reporters or by news wire. This mean of communication can also influence the quality and quantity of science reporting respectively. Only news magazines subsidiary of big newspapers done detailed science reporting because wire services, small daily newspapers have little time or finances to support the coverage of detailed science stories.
In addition, significance of science reporting is below the bench mark to get the interest of general audience because science communicator and editor in chief will never settle on the stories which readers finds interesting.
Moreover, science stories developed by the journalists are not familiar with the scientific jargon as they are not from the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) background. Mostly journalists have the college degree majored in Media and Communication studies this is why they are not producing the way it should be.