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Text: Professor of Practice Annamari Huovinen

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According to the latest Finnish Science Barometer (2024), 86 percent of Finns trust science. Internationally, this figure is high, but comparison with earlier barometers is a cause for concern: trust in science has fallen in Finland by almost ten percentage points in two years. Science communication is therefore ever more important – but at the same time more difficult than ever.

Trust in science is slowly eroding in Finland too

Finns’ trust in science is high by international standards. The starting point is therefore good. Trust is nevertheless gradually eroding, and the reason for this change is interesting. It does not seem to stem from a lack of knowledge but rather from the fact that if scientific results are not ideologically or politically pleasing, people decide not to trust them. The Science Barometer highlighted that supporters of the Finns Party and the Centre Party in particular question scientific results.

What, then, lies behind this questioning? According to Larson and Bersoff (2025), the problem of science is not a lack of trust but a lack of influence: researchers’ voices are not loud enough relative to the surrounding noise. Noise is everything that prevents the public from focusing on the messages of science or that distorts research-based knowledge. Matters are not helped by the fact that scholars are not always very skilled or willing to communicate in today’s complex and constantly changing communication environments.

Trolls and cat videos as competitors

The upheaval in the media is already an old phenomenon, but the pace of change only seems to be accelerating. With the emergence of social media, change in the media and communications landscape has been so rapid that even experts must hold on to their hats. Every social media platform follows its own logic, which you need to know before you dare step into the arena. Should you be on Instagram or Facebook, TikTok or X? In addition, there are podcasts and videos, blogs and newsletters. 

A researcher who used to write one good newspaper article must now choose which channels to be in, in what kind of voice and how often. Competition for attention is brutal, and the rivals are not just other researchers but also cat and sports videos, hate-mongers rising from the depths of the internet and the endless, faceless troll army of disinformation. Science communication also does not advance researchers’ careers in the same way as academic publishing, so it often depends on their own initiative and is handled alongside other work, if they have the time and energy.

There is will but not enough time

Eurobarometer 2025 reported that more than half of Europeans (58%) would like to know more about science and its new results, but lack of time (40%), lack of interest (37%) and lack of basic knowledge (36%) act as obstacles. The statistics are interesting and credible. For a non-professional, familiarising oneself with science requires effort, ability to concentrate and willingness to learn. The problem and its possible solutions are once again on science communicators’ desks: how to translate the slow and complex developments of science into content that is understandable, engaging and impactful, and how to get science’s messages to rise to the surface of the endlessly churning stream of content in different channels?

Artificial intelligence is also currently transforming from the ground up our understanding and practices of searching for, processing and assimilating information. AI helps researchers communicate more quickly and clearly and adapt their messages to different channels, but it offers the same help to trolls as well. Already now it is practically impossible for an ordinary citizen to judge from the appearance and content of a message whether the information is true, or false or misleading.

Is it worth striving for maximum visibility?

It would be tempting to aim for large audiences: social media channels are within everyone’s reach and publishing on them is free. Messages spread globally in real time. I have nevertheless come to think that in science communication, transparency, humanity and a recognisable human voice are competitive advantages rather than chasing the masses, probably increasingly so in future. As AI-generated content grows, more and more people are likely to long for curated, genuine content. Besides, when everyone is shouting on social media, science is inevitably beaten by light content produced in an instant.

It has long been said that the global network is not a natural scale for human communication (e.g. Dunbar 2010; Kraut, R. E., & Resnick, P. 2012), even though the internet and social media with their countless highways and fascinating side roads offer it to us. Participation and commitment weaken in groups that are too large and fragmented, whereas smaller, structured communities support interaction and norms. The toxic discussion culture in news comment sections is a good example of this: it is easy to misunderstand or judge others when interaction is built on a few words long comments from strangers.

Science around the campfire

I think about this as I sit in a lecture hall listening to a panel discussion. There are about thirty of us in the room. We are almost all strangers to one another, but the panelists answer questions from the audience, the audience turns towards each speaker in turn, nodding, someone always continues the previous thought. The atmosphere is interested and intense. We have all come here because we are genuinely keen to learn more.

Perhaps in science communication too, the most effective channels are ultimately those in which the resources for interaction are more diverse than on large-scale online platforms. Genuine influence and increase in understanding take place in groups where participants can be perceived as individuals. Big news can spread efficiently on broad forums, but deeper interpretation and the development of ideas occur when discussants can respond to each other’s messages both verbally and physically, and thereby build a shared conversational atmosphere.

Perhaps human beings are at their best around the campfire, in science communication, too.

Sources

• Dunbar, R., 2010. How Many Friends Does One Person Need? Dunbar’s Number and Other Evolutionary Quirks. Faber & Faber.
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• Kraut, R. E. & Resnick, P., 2012. Building Successful Online Communities: Evidence-Based Social Design. MIT Press.
• Larson, H. J. & Bersoff, D. M., 2025. Science's big problem is a loss of influence, not a loss of trust. Nature 2025 Apr;640(8058):314-317. doi: . PMID: 40200112.
• (in Finnish).

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The article was written by Professor of Practice Annamari Huovinen, who works at the Department of Management Studies at the School of Business in the subject of Organizational Communication.