Science Journalism Is Shrinking–Along With Public Trust In Science

Science Friday

Science Friday and WNYC Studios

Science, Life Sciences, Wnyc, Natural Sciences, Friday

4.4 • 6.3K Ratings

🗓️ 10 January 2024

⏱️ 18 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In 2023, a flood of science journalists lost their jobs. At the same time, public trust in science continues to decline.

Transcript

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0:00.0	It's been a rough year for science journalists. We've seen a lot of layoffs.
0:08.0	Fewer writers and editors often mean fewer stories and every layoff represents a loss of institutional knowledge that has helped
0:15.0	make those stories better.
0:16.7	It's Wednesday, January 10th and this is Science Friday.
0:20.5	Don't worry, we're not going anywhere.
0:32.0	Science publications like Natchio and Wired laid off substantial numbers of staffers in 2023.
0:33.7	But maybe the biggest blow was when Popular Science announced it would stop publishing
0:38.6	its magazine after 151 years.
0:41.9	And beyond talented folks losing their jobs, a recent Pew survey shows that just
0:47.0	57% of Americans think science has a mostly positive effect on society. This is down considerably since the beginning of the
0:56.1	COVID pandemic. Ira talks with two science journalists to help make sense of these trends.
1:02.1	Joining me to talk about the current state of science journalism and maybe even provide a little hope for the future.
1:08.0	Are my guests, Deborah Blum, science journalist, author, publisher of Undark magazine, director of the Knight Science
1:16.0	Journalism at MIT, and Sabrina Imbler, author and science reporter for Defector based in Brooklyn, New York.
1:24.4	Both of you, welcome to Science Friday. Welcome back.
1:26.8	Thank you. It's great to be here.
1:29.8	Thank you for having us.
1:31.0	You're welcome.
1:32.8	Sabrina, let me begin with you
1:34.4	because you wrote about the end of popular science
1:37.6	as we know it.
1:38.9	We've seen a lot of science journalism jobs cut this year,
	...

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