Resource of the Week #110: Helping Non-Researchers Evaluate Science News

Hello again. This week’s resource is a guide titled “‘I Don’t Know What to Believe . . . ’: Making Sense of Science Stories”. Its purpose is to help non-scientists evaluate scientific and medical content in newspapers and other popular media.

Recently an AuthorAID community member told me that this guide has become available in Chinese. The original British version, which is from an organization called Sense about Science, appeared several years ago. A US version now is available too.

This guide introduces peer review, and it tells readers to check whether findings have been published in peer-reviewed journals. It also tells readers to avoid reaching firm conclusions on the basis of only 1 study.

How can members of the AuthorAID community use this resource? Here are 3 possibilities:

• If you give talks to non-researchers, perhaps include ideas from this guide. And perhaps recommend the guide.
• If you hear a non-researcher state conclusions that are not supported by peer-reviewed research, perhaps share ideas from this guide to help in thinking more critically.
• If you teach a beginning science course, maybe assign this guide or present ideas from it to introduce the students to peer review.

Until the next post—

Barbara