SCIENCE AND SOCIAL MEDIA
A guide for scientists in the hyper-connected era
XX SIPAV National Conference
Pisa - September 22, 2014
About me
credits: JD Hancock/FlickrLorenzo
Mannella
Freelance Journalist
MSc in Biotechnology
@Loremann
Research Fellow
UNIMORE
Summary
3. Social media in the lab
5. Social media for scientists
1. Social media and academic life
2. Social tools for science
4. Social experiments
Social media
Informal peer review in the 1950s
credits: The Athenaeum Club
Joint Editor 'Jack' Brimble would stuff his
pockets with papers submitted to Nature and
take them with him to the exclusive Athenæum
Club. Brimble would then quiz other scientific
members of the club over luncheon or coffee
on the merits of particular manuscripts. It was
an imperfect system with many flaws, but the
beginning of a review system nonetheless.
The map of knowledge, today
Social tools for science
credits: 10ch/FlickrYour social toolbox at a glance
source: PLoS Biology credits: mkhmarketing/Flickr
Your social toolbox at a glance
source: Nature News
In Nature's survey, a subset of scholars who
said they 'regularly visited' social media sites
were quizzed in detail about their activities.
Your social toolbox at a glance
Your social toolbox at a glance
Ichthyologists hooked on Facebook
credits: Donnie Nunley/Flickr
The problem:
- Cuyuni River of Guyana
- identify 5000 specimens
- less than a week’s time
- they turned to Facebook
- 90% of fishes identified
- less than 24h
Social media in the lab
The virtual particles smasher
Science is out there, too
“By providing outreach in
the form of courses and
workshops for
nonscientists in subjects
such as biotechnology, we
make the latest medical
advances more accessible,
understandable and less
threatening. It’s harder to
fear something one has
actually done side by side
with one’s high-school-age
son or daughter.”
- Ellen Jorgensen
cr ed its : E va n K af ka /W ire d U KSocial experiments
credits:PNAS
Around 700k users
1 week of testing on
3 million posts with
122 million words:
4 million positive
1.8 million negative
Facebook's experiment - PNAS
Experimental
evidence of
massive-scale
emotional
contagion
through social
networks
Was Facebook unethical?
“Although approval by an institutional
review board was not legally required for
this study, it would have been better for
everyone involved had the researchers
sought ethics review and debriefed
participants afterwards.”
- Michelle Meyer
What do you mean with 'ethical'?
credits: Nic McPhee/Flickr
“Ethics aren’t a
checklist. Nor are they
a universal. […] We
need ethics to not just
be tacked on, but to be
an integral part of how
everyone thinks about
what they study, build,
and do.”
Let's talk about you
credits: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center/Flickr
Please, as a scientist, share a
positive/negative experience
on a social network.
Social media for
Try to take it seriously
cr ed its : N ic ho la s Fe ltr onEvery single word matters
Research ripped apart
Misunderstandings
Try to avoid Ivory Towers
cr ed its : A 2K D es ig n/ F lic kr“The scientist has in
common with the
artist only this: that
he can find no better
retreat from the
world than his work
and also no stronger
link with the world
than his work.”
Conclusions
Define what you should share/keep private
Your social presence is not a source of stress
Ask yourself how social networks can help you
Test different social networks and find the best
Ask your institution for common guidelines
credits: JD Hancock/Flickr
Thank
You
For
Being
Here
Bibliography
Technology giants at war. Another game of thrones – Anonymous / The Economist (December 1, 2012)
http://www.economist.com/news/21567361-google-apple-facebook-and-amazon-are-each-others-throats-all-sorts-ways-another-game
An Introduction to Social Media for Scientists – Bik and Goldstein / PLoS Biology 11, e1001535 (April 23, 2013)
http://www.plosbiology.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pbio.1001535
Online collaboration: Scientists and the social network – van Noorden R / Nature 512, 126–129 (August 14, 2014)
http://www.nature.com/news/online-collaboration-scientists-and-the-social-network-1.15711
Predicting protein structures with a multiplayer online game – Cooper et al. / Nature 466, 756–760 (August 5, 2010)
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v466/n7307/full/nature09304.html
Engage with, don't fear, community labs – Jorgensen and Grushkin / Nature Medicine 17, 411 (April 7, 2011)
http://www.nature.com/nm/journal/v17/n4/full/nm0411-411.html
Experimental evidence of massive-scale emotional contagion through social networks – Kramer et al. / PNAS 111, 8788 (June
17, 2014)http://www.pnas.org/content/111/24/8788.abstract
Peer review: Trial by Twitter – Mandavilli A. / Nature 469, 286-287 (January 11, 2011)
http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110119/full/469286a.html
A Physicist´s Renewed Look at Biology. Twenty Years Later – Delbrück M / Nobel Lecture (December 10, 1969)
http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/1969/delbruck-lecture.html
Misjudgements will drive social trials underground – Meyer MN / Nature 511, 265 (July 17, 2014)
http://www.nature.com/news/misjudgements-will-drive-social-trials-underground-1.15553
What does the Facebook experiment teach us? – Boyd D / Medium (July 2, 2014)
