Are “stupid” readers merely the victims of poor writers?
By David Poulson
NASA has a nice piece here on communicating climate change.
It embodies the principals of KISS - Keep It Simple Stupid. That’s a nice acronym as a reminder of the need for clean writing that communicates clearly.
But it has always troubled me as some writers seem to think the need for simplicity implies that readers are, well, stupid.
Understanding an issue is not necessarily a measure of intelligence. It may be a measure of background, experience, time. Readers may be incredibly smart - they just haven’t had the opportunity, time or interest that you and your sources have had to dig into the issue you’re writing about.
It’s unfair to call them - well, most of them - stupid. If they don’t understand, perhaps it is the writer that is, er, less than intelligent. Or at least less than skilled. Or patient.
I do like the call for a 30-second elevator speech for communicating climate change. The advice in the NASA piece is to be concise, clear, jargon-free. Include a scientific point or two, perhaps all wrapped up in a metaphor.
That’s pretty good advice for a nut graph. It could be the kind of graph you keep in the “word depot” ready to get you out of a tight explanatory corner. If you find one that works for you, there’s no reason you can’t trot it out for more than one story. Some tools improve with use.
Bear in mind that this NASA piece cites a study indicating that only 7 percent of the population is completely dismissive of global warming. You’ll have a tough time reaching them regardless of rhetorical device.
That still leaves a healthy chunk of readers for you to serve.
October 13th, 2009 at 11:49 am
David Poulson nails it. Using jargon is not a sign of intelligence. It’s just jargon. It generally alienates your intended audience.
Some of the reporters I edit resist making things simple because they don’t want to “dumb down.” After a number of focus groups (of quite intelligent people), it’s clear they’re not stupid. They just don’t have the time (or inclination) to stay current on every issue that pops up. They don’t know your jargon. So report in plain language.
Far too many of us (reporters) spend entirely too much time talking among ourselves instead of talking to ‘real people.’ It gives us a distorted view of how news is used by the general population.
October 13th, 2009 at 6:15 pm
I believe it’s possible to render almost any scientific information into intelligible language in order to get the point across. However, it can’t always be boiled down into sound bites. A lot of people get information from headlines and YouTube videos and channel surfing…
One thing that would help a lot with issues like global warming would be to teach people how to tell a hawk from a handsaw so they know how to find credible reporting and also know that a sound bite is just the tip of the iceberg, so to speak. (I SO enjoy mixing metaphors).
The KISS principle works better for politicians, who can arrive at a position and keep repeating a short summary - but with many scientific issues, there may be no clear bottom line sufficient to make tough decisions easier. E.g., global warming - we are going to have to make some Hobson’s choices with respect to our energy sources, and people aren’t very good at making tough decisions even if they’re fairly well acquainted with the options. So I think the challenge is to write something that explains the subject and enables the reader to shift into a more functional mode. And of course that’s really hard.
October 19th, 2009 at 10:08 am
[...] I was interested when environmental journalist David Paulson linked from his blog Covering the Planet to a NASA piece on communicating climate change. David is interested in the idea, proposed in the [...]