Communications research has much to offer during the coronavirus crisis. But are we offering it?

Short piece on how invisible media+communications research seem to be even as societies struggles w/understanding and responding to an "infodemic" #ICA20 1/9 https://rasmuskleisnielsen.net/2020/05/22/communications-research-has-a-lot-to-offer-during-the-coronavirus-crisis-but-are-we-offering-it/

If we are relatively absent in a crisis like this, the result will be that important public (and policy) discussions of issues deeply intertwined with the core of our field are dumber than they could have been, and I think we should try to change that, for society, and for us 2/9

To get a sense of visibility, @_FelixSimon_ and I collected basic data on how often 124 living ICA Fellows working in English-language countries are in news on coronavirus. We find 405 news mentions from Jan 1 to May 20. Five fellows (four women and one man) account for half 3/9

These are some of the most distinguished and privileged scholars of communication in the world. Many have much to offer.

But median number of news mentions among the 124 is 0. Sixty-six of them do not return any results. It’s not even really a long tail, more like a stump. 4/9

Worth nothing that men, who account for 62% of 124 ICA Fellows in our data set but just 38% of news mentions have, some researchers analyzing academic work+career patterns argue, benefited disproportionally from dominant informal norms+formal rewards that were inward looking 5/9

In ocean of coronavirus crisis coverage, where Chartbeat reported 2.3 million articles on COVID-19 in the first three months of the year alone, with 405 mentions of more than a hundred of our most illustrious colleagues over four months, I think we are bordering on invisible 6/9

Many external factors limit us, and these we cannot really change, but perhaps also internal ones, which we can. Glad to see some change, including e.g @claesdevreese call for #opencomm, public engagment award in #ica_jsd, as well as decades of leadership from e.g KH Jamieson 7/9

Could we do more? I think we could, and would point to inspirations like @monkeycageblog, @BrendanNyhan @pbmehta @zeynep and others writing regularly, @Livingstone_S giving TedTalks, @datasociety where @zephoria has created amazing "trading zone". These are just some examples 8/9

Coronavirus pandemic is a communications crisis in addition to medical crisis (and much more). It is a moment where we can really help make a difference. I am not sure we are doing best we can, but I hope we will try. I think it would benefit both our societies and our field. 9/9

I wrote this blog post with research assistance from @_FelixSimon_ after @claesdevreese invited @JuliavanWeert @hjpaek @LeticiaBode @scheufele and me to discuss communications research and coronavirus crisis for an #ica20 panel.