Science Communication for the Willing
A helpful guide to sharing research (effectively) on Twitter
This year, many of my wonderfully smart and talented friends are in the academic job market. A couple of them have asked me how to use Twitter to communicate their job market papers and highlight key findings. As I spoke with them, I realized it could be helpful to share what I know about science communication more broadly.
Full disclosure: I am a third-year Ph.D. student at Harvard Kennedy School and the Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. This advice primarily applies to people who want to use Twitter and sites like it for science communication.
Science communication is awesome. When I returned to Twitter back in 2018, I quickly learned that the limitations of Twitter characters meant that when you shared research, you would have to boil it down to its essence. Bogging down an explanation with needless details only leads readers, who often scroll quickly through their timelines, to pass over what you find interesting. With that in mind, I have some general tips that have helped me increase engagement on tweets about research:
Punchline first, always.
On places like Twitter, first impressions are basically the name of the game. We scroll past what does not immediately catch our eyes. When someone sees the first tweet about your research, they should know three things off the bat:
- What question are you asking?
- Why does the question matter?
- Where can they learn more? (This usually comes in the form of a link.)
I have found that people who include their abstract, with the appropriate ALT text, gain the most traction because you can emphasize the punchline in the tweet, and then reference folks to the abstract for more details. One place that has consistently done this well is the National Bureau of Economic Research’s Twitter account. They almost always attach a screenshot of the abstract, tweet the punchline, and include a link in the first tweet about a research paper.
Simple language leads to more engagement.
In the past, when summarizing research articles, I’ve observed that the more accessible the language, the greater the engagement the tweet receives. It’s important to note that research shared with the world should not be saturated with jargon. Like any good research presentation, I should grasp the punchline of your question at the very beginning and at the very end.
Which is why I think it’s wise to get technical after the first tweet and before the last one. Two great examples of this are Dr. Florian Ederer and my good friend, Deborah Raji. This is namely to exploit a feature of Twitter, which will highlight the first tweet and the last one.
Clean and compelling graphs and figures make a difference.
Aside from highlighting an abstract in the first tweet, a graph that shows a clear and compelling relationship is a great bet. People like pictures, especially when they summarize something they did not know before!
If you are scrolling through the timeline, pictures likely catch your eye more than tweets with just words, which is why including a graph or figure can really bring together a research explanation. I would recommend against putting multiple figures into one tweet because sometimes Twitter crops images in an awkward way. Two people who do this exceptionally well are Drs. Ellora Derenoncourt and Kizzimekia Corbett.
The clearer each part of the explanation, the better.
The biggest challenge in explaining research to anyone is whether you can maintain clarity throughout. I love Twitter for this reason. It forces you to communicate science in a way that meets a lot of people where they’re at. If your goal is to signal that you know something, awesome. My advice would be to talk about what you know as clearly as you can and link to the more complex explanation.
Twitter threads basically represent how we talk about particular topics. If every part of how you talk about a research topic is clear, people will leave knowing why this question is important to you and why they should care too! One of the best examples of this is one of my favorite researchers: Dr. Jake Grumbach.
Engage with thoughtful questions and comments, never hate.
The way Twitter works is that when you share something online, people will respond in ways you could have never imagined. How things land will never be exactly how you intended. That’s why it’s great to sort of treat Twitter like a research seminar. Take what you hear, keep what makes sense, and be on the lookout for people wanting to know more. Also, don’t shy away from other forms of public scholarship that allow you to expound on your research, e.g., op-eds or interviews.
For those on the job market, keep your DMs open and/or make sure you have a very easy way to reach you. You never know how your research will resonate and fit in with broader conversations happening around you.
Timing matters more than you think.
As a social media connoisseur, I have learned over time that timing matters when we post things. For example, during the week, I tend to schedule tweets I want people to see at either 7:30 AM ET, 10:30 AM ET, or 3:30–4 PM ET. Why? People tend to wake up and read Twitter, take breaks right before lunch, or begin winding down right before work ends. Making a note of timing can be very helpful, and don’t be shy to retweet things a couple of times throughout the day so people who missed you the first time can catch it the second.
So, should you use Twitter to share your research?
Science communication is for the willing — those who are willing to learn aloud, teach what they know, and embrace what comes their way. That said, not all scientists are willing to communicate what they find through the digital space, and that’s okay.
Based on my observations, graduate students who utilize Twitter while in the academic job market have experienced significant benefits. A recent example involves my friend, Emma Rackstraw, who shared her job market paper on Twitter, leading to almost immediate coverage by a major news outlet. Twitter is an effective way to get on the radar of many people at once.
I sincerely hope this helps anyone who needs it. Sharing research can be hard, but digital spaces can help us find people who resonate with our work and encourage us to keep going.
As always, follow me on Instagram and Twitter @itsafronomics, and check out my new research page here. Good luck!
