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Popular Science, Overview
This entry applies a broad definition of popular science, referring to science to be consumed in our free time, largely for personal rather than professional reasons. It is science for fun: to experience the wonders of nature, to learn more about an issue that is important to you, on a friend's recommendation, or simply because a piece of promotional material caught your eye.
Although the term is most commonly associated with print media, popular science can exist in any medium. What popular science usually is not is the presence of science in explicitly fictional products. Fictional devices can be used by popular science, but its products are characteristically nonfiction. Neither is popular science journalism, although the two fields overlap considerably.
Popular science is generally produced by members—or supporters, at least—of the scientific community. Indeed, popular science has been criticized for being overly supportive of science. It is, however, also a space for reflection and may critique scientific ideas, institutions, or people in the process. Further, it allows scientists to talk across their own area of expertise or on topics the various structures of peer review would otherwise discourage. For some, the field also holds an appeal of democracy, offering a promise to talk directly to the public. All of this can be very attractive to popular science's producers as well as its audiences. However, for the same reasons, popular science can be a very controversial area, and the boundaries of what can and cannot be publicly described as science are hotly contested.
Locating Popular Science
What popular science is or means can be elusive to pin down. When thinking and talking about the topic, it is worth bearing in mind that different people can apply very different definitions of popular science. Indeed, some scholars may feel that the term is so lacking in coherent meaning as to be unworkable as an analytical category.
The (Multi)Media of Popular Science
Popular science is sometimes understood quite strictly in respects to the term's use as a category of contemporary bookselling: science books that are not exactly textbooks but would not be shelved with science fiction either. There are, however, several magazines that also publish quite explicitly as popular science, including, since 1872, the genre's namesake Popular Science. Moreover, several popular science books have been turned into documentaries. The opposite is also true, with documentaries spinning off into books (for example, Carl Sagan's Cosmos). Like other areas of publishing, popular science increasingly runs from blog to book or book to blog. Popular science magazines and newspaper sections produce pod-casts. They will also blog parts or full articles, and the popular science magazines SEED and Discover have both enrolled high-profile science bloggers to publish under their banners.
The various spin-offs of popular science also include museum exhibitions, live shows, and toys. Many writers will tour, some sell branded clothing, and the Bad Science Web site even sells pro-MMR (measles-mumps-rubella) baby bibs and anti-quackery underpants. Just as printed popular science products have been inspired by documentaries, there are books based on exhibitions and several bearing the branding of major museums. Some scholars argue that such products are not only associated with popular science by way of cross-promotion with books but are popular science products in their own right. Museum exhibitions may also cover the “Science of …” Star Trek or James Bond, independent of whether books are involved or not.
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- Associations and Organizations
- Agricultural Communicators of Tomorrow
- American Association for Public Opinion Research
- American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)
- American Medical Association
- American Medical Writers Association
- Association for Communication Excellence
- Center for Science in the Public Interest
- Council for the Advancement of Science Writing
- Environmental Defense Fund
- ETC Group
- Greenpeace
- International Science Journalism Associations
- National Association of Science Writers
- Physicians for Social Responsibility
- Public Communication of Science and Technology
- Royal Society
- SciDev.Net
- Scientists' Institute for Public Information
- Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence
- Sigma Xi
- Society for Risk Analysis
- Society for Technical Communication
- Society of Environmental Journalists
- Union of Concerned Scientists
- Audiences, Opinions, and Effects
- Active Audiences and Science
- Attentive Public
- Audiences for Science
- Children's Television and Science
- Communicating Science to Children
- Gender Representations of Scientists
- Health Literacy
- Interpretive Communities
- Knowledge Gap Hypothesis
- Popular Science and Formal Education
- Public Understanding of Research
- Public Understanding of Science
- Role Models in Science
- Science Indicators, History of the NSB Project on
- Science Literacy
- Scientist—Journalist Relations
- Surveys
- Technological Literacy
- Trust and Attitudes
- Challenges, Issues, and Controversies
- Abortion
- Alien Abduction
- Alternative Medicine
- Asteroid Impacts
- Bioterrorism
- Climate Change, Communicating
- Cloning
- Colonizing Other Worlds
- Creationism
- Digital Divide
- Drug Advertising
- Food Irradiation
- Intelligent Design in Public Discourse
- Invasive Species
- Maverick Science and Journalism
- NIMBY (“Not In My Back Yard”)
- Nuclear Power
- Nuclear Waste
- Nuclear Weapons
- Pseudoscience
- Scientist—Journalist Conflicts
- Skepticism
- Stem Cell Controversy
- UFOlogy
- Vaccines, Fear of
- Changing Awareness, Opinion, and Behavior
- Alcohol, Risk Communication for
- Anti-Drug Campaigns
- Anti-Smoking Campaigns
- Breast Cancer Communication
- Cancer Prevention and Risk Communication
- Communication Campaigns in Health and Environment
- Computer-Tailored Messages
- Evidence-Based Medicine
- Fear Appeals
- Food Safety
- Health Communication and the Internet
- Health Communication, Overview
- Highway Safety
- HIV/AIDS Prevention and Communication
- Resource Mobilization
- Social Marketing
- Critical Influences and Events
- Global and International Aspects
- Africa, Science in
- Australia, Science in
- Canada, Science Communication in
- East Asia, Science Communication in
- Europe, Research System in
- European Space Agency
- India, Science and Science Communication in
- Latin America, Science Communication in
- Mexico, Science Communication in
- National Development, Science and Technology in
- Government Agencies (U.S.)
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, U.S.
- Department of Agriculture, U.S.
- Department of Energy, U.S.
- Environmental Protection Agency, U.S.
- Food and Drug Administration, U.S.
- House Science Committee, U.S.
- National Academies, U.S.
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration, U.S.
- National Institutes of Health, U.S.
- National Science Foundation, U.S.
- Occupational Safety and Health Administration, U.S.
- Office of Science and Technology Policy, U.S.
- Office of Technology Assessment, U.S.
- Public Health Service, U.S.
- Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, U.S.
- Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, U.S.
- Surgeon General, U.S.
- History, Philosophy, and Sociology of Science
- Actor-Network Theory
- Deductive Logic
- Inductive Logic
- Invisible College
- Land Grant System, U.S.
- Logical Positivism
- Peer Review
- Postmodernism and Science
- Science and Politics
- Science, Technology, and Society Studies
- Scientific Consensus
- Scientific Ethos
- Scientific Journal, History of
- Scientific Method
- Scientific Societies
- Technological Determinism
- Tenure System
- Two Cultures
- Understanding Expertise
- Visible Scientist
- Important Figures
- Asimov, Isaac
- Attenborough, David
- Carson, Rachel
- Carver, George Washington
- Clarke, Arthur C.
- Crick, Francis
- Darwin, Charles
- Dawkins, Richard
- Dewey, John
- Einstein, Albert
- Feynman, Richard
- Franklin, Benjamin
- Galilei, Galileo
- Gould, Stephen Jay
- Hawking, Stephen
- Kuhn, Thomas
- Latour, Bruno
- McClintock, Barbara
- Mead, Margaret
- Mendel, Gregor
- Merton, Robert K.
- Muir, John
- Nelkin, Dorothy
- Nye, Bill
- Oppenheimer, J. Robert
- Popper, Karl
- Sagan, Carl
- Snow, C. P.
- Teller, Edward
- Venter, J. Craig
- Watson, James D.
- Journal Publications
- Key Cases and Current Trends
- Agricultural Biotechnology
- Alternative Energy, Overview
- Architecture, Sustainable
- Astrobiology
- Astronomy, Public Communication of
- Avian Flu
- Biofuels
- Bioinformatics
- Bovine Somatotropin (BST or BGH)
- Fuel Cell Technology
- Gene
- Gene Therapy
- Holography
- Low-Level Radiation
- Nanotechnology
- Nutrigenomics
- Nutrition and Media
- Obesity Epidemic
- Pandemics, Origins of
- Recombinant DNA
- Reproductive Medicine
- Satellites, Science of
- Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome
- Solar Energy
- String Theory
- Sustainability
- Synthetic Biology and Genomics
- Toxicogenomics
- Wind Power
- Law, Policy, Ethics, and Beliefs
- Big Science
- Bioethicists as Sources
- Censorship in Science
- Clean Air Act
- Clean Water Act
- Community “Right to Know”
- Conflicts of Interest in Science
- Embargo System
- Endangered Species Act
- Environmental Impact Statements
- Environmental Justice
- Ethical, Legal, and Social Issues (ELSI)
- Eugenics
- Food Libel Laws
- Gene Patenting
- Institutional Review Board
- Nanotechnology, Regulation of
- Planetary Protection
- Precautionary Principle
- Religion, Science, and Media
- Research Ethics, Overview
- Risk Analysis
- Risks and Benefits
- Science Communication and Indigenous North America
- Social Justice
- Technology Assessment
- Toxic Substances Regulation
- Major Infrastructural Initiatives
- Practices, Strategies, and Tools
- Professional Roles and Careers
- Agricultural Journalism
- Beat Reporting
- Career Paths, Medical Writing/Medical Journalism
- Career Paths, Science/Environmental Journalism
- Crisis Communication
- Disaster Coverage
- Environmental Journalism
- Freelancing
- Government Public Information
- Medical Journalism
- Public Relations and Science
- Scientist—Journalist Relations
- Social and Behavioral Science Reporting
- Technical Communication
- Weather Reporting
- Public Engagement Approaches
- Theory and Research
- Agenda Setting and Science
- Conversation and Science Communication
- Cultivation Theory and Science
- Deficit Model
- Diffusion of Innovations
- Digital Rhetoric and Science
- Discourse Analysis and Science
- Evaluation of Science Communication
- Framing and Priming in Science Communication
- Information Seeking and Processing
- Information Society
- Information Subsidies
- Opinion Leaders and Opinion Leadership
- Optimistic Bias
- Planned Behavior, Theory of
- Psychometric Paradigm
- Rhetoric of Medicine
- Rhetoric of Science
- Social Amplification of Risk Framework
- Social Epistemology
- Spiral of Silence and Science
- Third-Person Effect
- Uncertainty in Science Communication
- Venues and Channels
- Internet, History of
- Media Convergence
- Newspaper Science Pages
- Online Media and the Sciences
- Popular Science, Overview
- Science and the Giant Screen
- Science Centers and Science Museums
- Science Circus
- Science Documentaries
- Science Fiction
- Science in Advertising
- Science in Magazines
- Science in the Movies
- Science in Virtual Worlds
- Science Magazines
- Science on Radio
- Science Shops
- Science Theater
- Scientific Publishing, Overview
- Television Science
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