Environmental communication for expert audiences - experimenting three approaches

Abstract

We studied three novel approaches in environmental science communication for experts: gamification, virtual reality, and art-based scenario workshops and analyze participants’ perceptions through qualitative interviews and a survey. Four dimensions emerged from the interviews: enjoyment, usability, sociability, and learning that were found to be important for scientific communication. The approaches were perceived as enjoyable and beneficial for creating dialogue. However, the simplification of the information reduced its usability for experts. The approaches were found suitable for understanding other participants’ viewpoints rather than disseminating knowledge about the content. Experts as a target group require special focus in the development of science communication.