211 Writing for lay audiences.

Abstract This presentation will provide practical guidance on writing about animal science and related subjects for lay audiences. First, it will identify reasons to do such writing. These reasons include giving audience members useful information; helping dispel misconceptions; establishing rapport, trust, and dialogue; attracting funding; drawing people to the field; providing a basis for work by public information professionals and journalists; and increasing one’s own insight. Much of the presentation will center on 15 suggestions: 1) Know your audience. 2) Relate the content to the audience’s knowledge and interests—and thus build bridges rather than watering things down. 3) Include human (or near-human) interest. 4) Include narrative, because stories tend to be memorable and engaging. 5) Carefully pace the content. 6) Generally, keep the language simple. In particular, use mainly common words, minimize technical jargon, beware of using many acronyms, introduce new terms gently, use familiar units, and round off numbers. 7) State general concepts before details. 8) Consider including examples (and non-examples). 9) Respectfully counter misconceptions, for instance by providing transformative explanations. 10) Make relationships of ideas clear—for example, by showing reasoning, using transitional words and phrases, and providing diagrams. 11) Consider providing visuals; however, keep them simple. 12) Provide access to further information. 13) Design materials for readability. For example, avoid long sentences and long paragraphs, and consider using devices such as subheadings, bulleted or numbered lists, boldface or italics, and sidebars or text boxes. 14) Check with the audience. 15) Also apply these tips when working with public information staff and journalists. Excerpts from writing for lay audiences will be briefly discussed as related to the suggestions for doing such writing. In addition, sources of guidance on writing for lay audiences will be identified. These resources include plainlanguage.gov, the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Communication Toolkit, the Open Notebook, books on science journalism and related subjects, sources of examples of excellent science writing, and organizations in science communication and related fields. Brief exercises will be included. The speaker will be glad to answer questions at the end of the session and after the session.