16

Audiences of science
communication between
pluralisation, fragmentation
and polarisation
Mike S. Schäfer and Julia Metag

Introduction
When scholars, politicians or stakeholders talk about science communication, they talk
about, for example, the public understanding of science and technology, public engagement,
the alleged deficits in the scientific literacy of laypeople, or society’s trust in science. Explicitly
or implicitly, they talk about the potential audiences of science communication, their
interest, their attitudes, their roles in the communicative process, and the potential of
science communication to reach these audiences, engage them and have an impact on their
attitudes and behaviour.
From early on, audiences have been a major component of how science com-
munication was thought about and conceptualised in scholarly circles (e.g., Gregory
and Miller 1998). But despite the importance given to audiences in science com-
munication, they were, and still are, often difficult to grasp (e.g., Einsiedel 2000; Felt
2000). Audience conceptions in science communication are often under-defined and
remain implicit rather than explicit, but also audience conceptions vary considerably.
They oscillate between conceptions of more general (‘mass’) and more specialised
audiences, between more passive and more active audiences, between more local or
geographically dispersed audiences or between individualised and collective audi-
ences (for overviews Bucchi 2008; Metag 2017; Trench 2008).
The under-developed understanding of audiences also has to do with (alleged)
changes of science communication and its audiences. In recent years, scholars have
diagnosed fundamental shifts in science communication more generally and in its
audience structures and composition more specifically (e.g., Brossard 2013; Schäfer
2017). The first major shift concerns the active vs. passive role of audiences: general
models of science communication have shifted from unilinear, one-directional

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Mike S. Schäfer and Julia Metag

communication models aiming mainly at disseminating knowledge over participa-

tory, dialogical models to societalised models allowing for conflict and contestation of
science (for overviews see Akin and Scheufele 2017; Trench 2008) – and conceptions
of science communication audiences have shifted accordingly. The second major
shift concerns the assumption of a singular, monolithic audience: In past years,
scholars and stakeholders have diagnosed a plurality and potential pluralisation of
audiences, which may even give rise to audience fragmentation and polarisation (e.g.,
Schmidt et al. 2018; Williams et al. 2015).
Connected to these shifting conceptions and diagnosed changes are empirical
studies which have assessed audience characteristics and developments (for an over-
view see Metag and Schäfer 2018). There is abundant scholarship on the uses and
effects of science communication – i.e. different formats, content, topics and so on –
from a variety of disciplines such as communication science, psychology, sociology or
from interdisciplinary fields like Science and Technology Studies (Metag 2017).
The present chapter summarises and reviews this scholarship and reflects upon its
implications for science communication research and practice. We first lay out how
audience conceptions in science communication have developed over time and what
changes of science communication audiences have been diagnosed. Then, we review
empirical research on science communication audiences, and summarise and reflect
upon it in the concluding section.

From passive mass to active participants: audience conceptions

Audiences have been conceptualised in various ways in scholarship on science
communication. The general models that have been used in science communication
have changed, or diversified, and are tied to different underlying understandings of
audience(s). The audience conceptions embedded in these models are not always
entirely clear. But the corresponding audience roles and characteristics can be ex-
plicated from the respective scholarship.
Scholars have described these conceptual models and their development in similar
ways, albeit using different labels. Most of them describe a trend from ‘linear to more
complex models’ (Schmid-Petri and Bürger 2020: 105). Akin and Scheufele (2017),
for example, describe them as ranging from ‘knowledge deficit models’ over ‘dia-
logue and engagement models’ to ‘communication in context’ models (Akin and
Scheufele 2017: 27; see also Scheufele 2013, 2014). Similarly, Trench (2008) has
described ‘dissemination’, ‘dialogue’ and ‘conversation’ models. With more collo-
quial terms but conveying the same meaning, Dahinden has described them as ‘ivory
tower’, ‘glasshouse’ and ‘marketplace’ models (Dahinden 2004). Thus, when de-
scribing the general models of science communication, most authors distinguish three
variants (cf. Akin and Scheufele 2017; Bauer et al. 2007; Trench 2008: 130f.):
The first prominent model – which has been labelled the ‘dissemination’ (Trench
2008: 131), ‘public understanding of science’ (e.g., Metag 2017: 254) or ‘deficit model’
(e.g., Akin and Scheufele 2017; Bucchi 2008) (see Table 16.1) – assumes that the
public is not sufficiently informed about science and technology and that disseminating
more information to the public will improve people’s knowledge about science and,

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thus, raise societal support for science. Thus, scientific literacy is the main dependent
variable with which studies following this paradigm are concerned (Miller 1983).
Following this way of thinking, scientists are imagined to be in their ‘ivory tower’, i.e.
doing their research in an isolated manner and not being in touch with or part of the
general public. Often, the specific understanding of ‘the public’ is not further elabo-
rated upon by scholars advocating this model (for critical perspectives on this see
Einsiedel 2000; Felt 2000). This shows that how the public constitutes itself does not
matter for the deficit model. It is based on a linear and unidirectional idea of how
communication about science exerts effects, similar to a hypodermic needle model in
communication science (Schmid-Petri and Bürger 2020). The implicit conception of
the audience embedded here is, correspondingly, that of a monolithic, uniform mass of
passive recipients which are educated via one-way communication by scientists who
are in a teaching role (Trench 2008: 131) and, potentially, by journalists who function
as translators of those scientists (Gerhards and Schäfer 2009). While the mass audience
is not further subdivided or individualised, the notion is that of an audience of advice-
seekers who are in need of, and benefit from, scientific information (Dahinden 2004).
The second prominent model has been called the ‘dialogue’ (e.g., Trench 2008: 131)
or ‘public engagement’ model (Bauer and Jensen 2011). Generally, it emphasises an
increasingly more ‘open’ (Buysse 2007) and ‘egalitarian’ (Weingart 2005: 23) com-
munication between science and society, and moves away from the singular focus on
increasing the audience’s knowledge about and support for science, to a broader range
of attitudes that also includes interest or trust in science (Bubela et al. 2009). In the
context of this model, audience conceptions also became more nuanced: the public is
regarded as being more equal to scientists and encouraged to participate in scientific
debates and policy making. This implies that science communication research is not
only concerned with people’s support for science but also with how the public can be
encouraged to engage in debates about scientific issues. This has to do with the ac-
knowledgment that alleged ‘laypeople’ may in fact have domain-specific expertise
equal to, or even exceeding, scientific expertise (see the seminal work of Wynne
1996). Thus, active participation in science by non-scientists and the dialogue between
science and society is at the core of this model (Akin and Scheufele 2017).
Consequently, the public is conceptualised as an active citizenry who makes use of
their voices and can also act as public experts (Dahinden 2004).
A third model – dubbed the ‘conversation’ (Trench 2008: 131), ‘communication in
context’ (Akin and Scheufele 2017: 27) or ‘marketplace’ model (Dahinden 2004) –
emphasises the ‘often contentious and politicised debates that tend to surround
communication about science in the real world’ (Akin and Scheufele 2017: 27; also
Scheufele 2014). Mentioning fields like gene editing, climate science or vaccination,
it acknowledges that science is often an object of broader societal debates that also
evoke ethical, legal, social or regulatory questions, for which scientific answers are
difficult to find (Scheufele 2013). Relatedly, the model posits that in such debates,
the roles of science and societal stakeholders – including the importance and argu-
mentative power of their respective epistemologies – are equal. The role of audiences
in this type of science communication differs from the previous two models, even
though it is often not explained in the respective conceptions: audiences are active

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Table 16.1 General models of science communication and their corresponding

audience conceptions

General Science Dissemination Dialogue Conversation

communication
model

Related Public understanding Public engagement Science in political

concepts/labels of science; deficit with science; lay settings; multi-
model; expertise; directional-
popularisation; participation; two- communication
transfer; one-way- way-
communication communication
Ideological/ Scientism; Pragmatism; Participatory
philosophical technocracy constructivism; democracy,
associations social relativism; civic
responsibility; science; trust
participatory deficit; crisis of
democracy; co- confidence
construction
Conceptualised Expert, teacher Expert, but also Stakeholder, conflict
role of science dialogue partner party
Audience Mass 'lay' audience, Dialogue partner, Stakeholder, conflict
conception pupils public experts party
Audience activity Passive Active Active
Envisaged effects Knowledge Effects for both Negotiation of
acquisition in audiences and regulatory, ethical,
audience which science, raising sociopolitical and
leads to more mutual awareness, other issues
positive attitudes respect, trust, more touching upon
and societal positive attitudes science
legitimation of on both sides
science

Based on Akin and Scheufele 2017; Bauer et al. 2007; Bucchi 2008; Gerhards and Schäfer 2009; Lewenstein 2003; Metag
2017; Schmid-Petri and Bürger 2020; Trench 2008.

participants in the debates who do not restrict themselves to scientific topics but set
topics on the agenda following their own criteria of relevance, and discussing them
with arguments that may deviate from established science or the scientific episte-
mology, or even outright negate it (Dahinden 2004; Scheufele 2014).

Diagnoses of audience pluralisation, fragmentation

and polarisation
Alongside the evolution of science communication models and the corresponding audi-
ence conceptions, changes in the communicative and media ecosystem surrounding sci-
ence communication have been diagnosed. These ‘tectonic transformations’ (Scheufele

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2013: 14042) have been assumed to lead to substantial changes in audience characteristics
and structure. However, scholars have claimed that a plurality of science communication
audiences has always existed and may have increased in recent years. The idea that science
communication audiences may have always been diverse has already been part of the
conceptual debate of the abovementioned science communication models. Scholars like
Trench (2008) argued early on that the different science communication models may not
be indicative of a linear development of science communication itself in which dialogue
supplants dissemination, but rather of a pluralisation of science communication, where
different models stand side by side and where different parts of the audience may be
susceptible to different kinds of science communication (Trench 2008). In addition, re-
search has shown that different parts of the population are reached by science commu-
nication to different degrees, on different channels and with different effects, e.g., people
from rural and urban regions, people with different levels of education, people with dif-
ferent genders, ages or varying degrees of religiosity (e.g., Kawamoto et al. 2013; Lee et al.
2005; Roten 2004). While some segments of the audience may be highly interested in
science and science-related issues, others are not and cannot easily be reached via
knowledge dissemination, for example (see already Miller 2001). In recent years, this
plurality may have increased further due to a general diversification of milieus and lifestyles
in modern societies (Bauer et al. 2007: 83f.), increasingly diverse media offerings online and
offline (Brossard 2013) or an increasing presence of voices presenting alternatives to, or
actively opposing, established science (Bubela et al. 2009; Harambam and Aupers 2015).
Scholars have also feared that this plurality may lead to fragmented and polarised audiences.
These concerns are tied to the specifics of the digital information environment.

Search engine algorithms, and other websites as well, provide users with informa-
tion that is deemed suitable based on additional information about, for example, past
search behaviour. In turn, they ‘hide’ other information, producing so-called ‘filter
bubbles’ (Pariser 2011) that users may not be aware of. The rise of social media has
given this phenomenon an inherently social component, too: In such media, users
can decide for themselves whom to follow or what content to receive, and, ac-
cordingly, may filter out perspectives that seem foreign to them. This has been
hypothesised to lead to an ‘echo chamber’ effect in which certain views are not
challenged but rather echoed and, consequently, fortified in online communities
(Sunstein 2001, 2009).
(Schäfer 2015: 325)

This may have two consequences: First, audience members not interested in science
to begin with may be less and less exposed to science-related issues at all, because they
can now compose their own media diets (Brossard 2013; Brossard and Scheufele
2013). As a result, ‘knowledge gaps’ or ‘digital divides’ may emerge between those
interested in science, and those not (Metag 2017). Second, positions and opinions
may become increasingly polarised, i.e. different segments of the population may
increasingly oppose one another, particularly around contested scientific issues that
are tied to political ideology and sociocultural worldviews in countries like the US,
such as climate science, vaccination, or creationism (Hilgard and Li 2017: 81).

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Empirical findings on science communication audiences

There is a considerable amount of empirical research available on the pluralisation as
well as on the fragmentation or polarisation of audiences in science communication.
Many of these studies focus on the Anglophone or European context (Corner et al. 2012;
Hart et al. 2015; Roh et al. 2015; Tranter 2019) with fewer studies in Asian, African
or South American contexts (for exceptions see Detenber et al. 2016; Guenther et al.
2018). Most studies focus on a single country; cross-national comparisons make up a
smaller part (Birch 2019; Metag et al. 2018).
With regards to methodologies and methods, survey research is very prominent in
the study of audience views, particularly on science in general but also on controversial
science topics such as climate change and related fragmentation or polarisation ten-
dencies (Drummond and Fischhoff 2019; Leiserowitz et al. 2013a; Schäfer et al. 2018;
Tranter 2019). Experiments are mostly used when effects of media content (e.g.,
framing effects) on audience perceptions of a scientific issue are of interest (Hardy et al.
2019; Roh et al. 2015). For online and social media, network analysis has also been
prominently used to assess which audiences emerge or which publics form themselves
online depending on a specific scientific issue (e.g., Elgesem et al. 2015; Häussler 2019;
Kaiser and Puschmann 2017). Although the relevant scholarship is large, rather diverse
and has a number of notable gaps, several robust findings can be taken from it.

Assessing audience segmentation

Segmentation analyses are rooted in the observation that subgroups of the population
differ in their perceptions of science (e.g., people from urban and rural areas or with
different educational levels (Kawamoto et al. 2013)) and in their perceptions of
specific research fields, like animal experimentation (Crettaz von Roten 2013),
nuclear energy (Kristiansen et al. 2018), or nanotechnology (Lee et al. 2005). These
perceptions vary by sex, age, education or religiosity. Consequently, segmentation
analyses aim to shed light on the larger patterns that lie behind these individual-level
differences. One can differentiate between three different types of segmentation
analyses (cf. Metag and Schäfer 2018: 996f.): ‘sociodemographic’ analyses which
segment on ‘demographics (education, race, income, gender)’ which are then
‘crosstabbed with media use[,] involvement and behavior’ (Slater 1996), ‘psycho-
graphic’ analyses which group the public based on their attitudes and link these
segments to sociodemographics and behavioural variables (Wind 1978), and ‘beha-
vioural’ analyses which segment the public based on variables such as consumption
patterns or channels of communication (Yankelovich and Meer 2006). The results of
such segmentation analyses in the field of science communication provide insights
about existing audiences in science communication.
Most such analyses are psychographic segmentation analyses, many of them fo-
cusing on people’s general attitudes towards science (cf. Füchslin 2019). This research
started in the early 2000s, mainly promoted by the British Office of Science and
Technology (OST), partly in cooperation with the Wellcome Trust (OST and The
Wellcome Trust 2001). These studies revealed that the British public could be

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segmented into six groups from ‘confident believers’ and ‘technophiles’ through
‘supporters’ all the way to the ‘concerned’, the ‘not sure’ and ‘not for me’ groups
(Office of Science and Technology 2005). Studies in other countries similarly came
to the conclusion that science communication audiences could be subdivided into a
spectrum of population segments ranging from (almost) unconditional support to-
wards science and being very interested in science to criticism, scepticism or disin-
terest (e.g., ‘Sciencephiles’ to ‘Disengaged’) (Besley 2018; Nisbet and Markowitz
2014; Okamura 2016; Pullman et al. 2019; Runge et al. 2018; Schäfer et al. 2018).
With regards to specific scientific issues, most research comes from the US (for an
overview see Hine et al. 2014), with the Global Warmings Six Americas studies being
one of the first and arguably most prominent segmentation studies (Leiserowitz et al.
2013a; Roser-Renouf et al. 2016). The authors identified six audience segments with
different attitudes towards climate change: the ‘Alarmed’, who are most engaged about
global warming; the ‘Concerned’, who believe that global warming exists but are less
involved; the ‘Cautious’, who are not as certain and do not think climate change is a
threat to them personally; the ‘Disengaged’, who have not thought about the issue much;
the ‘Doubtful’, who doubt either that climate change exists and/or that it is caused by
human activity; and the ‘Dismissive’, who firmly believe that global warming is not
happening (Leiserowitz et al. 2013a; Roser-Renouf et al. 2016). By now, such segments
have also been identified in other countries: Australia, where also six global warming
segments were discovered (Morrison et al. 2013; Morrison et al. 2018) as well as in India
(Leiserowitz et al. 2013b), while in Germany and the Netherlands only five segments
were detected with the Dismissive being not present (Metag et al. 2017; Wonneberger
et al. 2020). In Singapore, only three segments were identified: the concerned, the
disengaged and the passive (Detenber et al. 2016).
All these psychographic segmentation studies analyse what the audience looks like
in different countries with regards to their attitudes towards science or specific
science-related topics. However, from a science communication perspective, it is also
relevant whether such different audience segments inform themselves differently
about science and related issues. Yet not all studies mentioned above, and not even
the majority of them, take into account different segments’ use of information about
science. Those who do, however, reveal that the segments have distinct media re-
pertoires when it comes to science communication. Runge, Brossard and Xenos
(2018: 1037) even state that ‘science-related media use accounted for the greatest
variation across all conditions and all segments’ and these science communication
media repertoires differ from people’s media and information use where other issues,
such as everyday news, are concerned (Metag et al. 2018; Runge et al. 2018). Some
studies using psychographic segmentation approaches analyse in a second step how
the different attitude segments use media and information sources about science
(Metag et al. 2017; Runge et al. 2018; Schäfer et al. 2018). They show that segments
who are not engaged in science or global warming (such as the Doubtful in
the Global Warmings studies or the Disengaged in the general science-related atti-
tudes studies) do not look for information about science or climate change actively
but rather come across it inadvertently, for example during their routine television
use (Metag et al. 2017; Runge et al. 2018; Schäfer et al. 2018). On the contrary,

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people who belong to audience segments who are more involved in a scientific issue,
such as the Concerned Activists or the Alarmed with regard to climate change, use
information sources more frequently and actively. Thus, they could be addressed by
campaigns through multiple channels (Metag et al. 2017). For segments based on
general attitudes towards science, Schäfer et al. (2018) found that the highly engaged
‘Sciencephiles’ inform themselves actively and frequently about science, use online
sources a lot to do so, and tend to consume quality content in which complex
scientific issues are presented (cf. Koch et al. 2019). In the US, ‘Protective
Progressives reported the greatest levels of attention to science and technology, new
scientific developments and the political and ethical implications of emerging tech-
nologies online, in newspaper and on television’ (Runge et al. 2018: 1036). This
frequent contact with scientific information also extends to non-mediated sources
such as visits to zoos and museums or attending scientific events. Segments with
more positive attitudes towards science use these non-mediated forms of science
communication more frequently than segments which are more distanced from
science (Schäfer et al. 2018).
Segmentation studies using ‘behavioural’ approaches identify segments of the public
based on their patterns of information and media use with regard to science-related
issues. Thus, they provide detailed insights into individual media repertoires for staying
informed about science. Kawamoto et al. (2013), while not including science-related
information use, took account of general news usage in their segmentation approach.
They could show that the ‘Sciencephiles’ segmented of the public use media sig-
nificantly more than others, though the small number of media-related variables only
allowed for very general conclusions. A study which segmented German and Swiss
citizens exclusively based on their science-related information behaviour found five
segments in each country (Metag et al. 2018). These information user segments are
very comparable and range from those who inform themselves frequently about sci-
ence – the ‘Active Seekers’ and ‘Science Consumers’ – to those who hardly get in
contact with any information about science and research (the ‘Non-Users’). There are
also nuanced differences in the science-related information repertoires with regard to
the channels of information. People belonging to the ‘Active Seekers’ in Switzerland,
for example, used reputable online sources such as websites of scientific institutions
extensively, while social media play an important role for the ‘Science Consumers’ in
Germany to get information about science (Metag et al. 2018). Further analyses also
showed that media use – similarly to positive attitudes towards science – correlates with
non-mediated contact with science: Those segments who frequently used different
kinds of media for information about science also come into contact with science more
often through events, museum and zoo or botanical garden visits, and talks with friends
and acquaintances (Metag et al. 2018).

Assessing fragmentation and polarisation

An
Analysis of audience fragmentation and polarisation has related strongly to public
communication about climate science and climate change in the US in the available
scholarship. A lot of this research finds that US citizens’ perceptions of climate

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change, of the underlying science and of the policy options available to mitigate it are
strongly polarised along partisan lines (Bolin and Hamilton 2018; McCright and
Dunlap 2011). This is further related to the news media’s apparent deepening of
partisan divisions with regard to climate change (Bolsen and Shapiro 2018) and to the
way online communication seems to be structured in ideologically homogeneous
communities (Williams et al. 2015).
This leads to the question whether a similar fragmentation or even polarisation of
audiences can be found across different scientific issues and across different countries.
There is not enough research available yet to answer this question, but research does
show that the association of political ideology with specific scientific issues is
important for the extent of audience polarisation, and that this association differs
between national contexts (Birch 2019). Thus, the US debate about audience
polarisation regarding climate change in the US may lead to overestimating
polarisation on other issues and on the same issue in other countries.
Online communication and the current debate about mis- and disinformation as
well as about filter bubbles and echo chambers have given rise to fear of an increased
polarisation of science communication audiences in the digital information en-
vironment (Schäfer 2020). Processes such as motivated reasoning, i.e. interpreting
scientific facts in very different ways depending on one’s individual predispositions
and attitudes, have certainly been causes for polarised publics even before the internet
(Druckman and Bolsen 2011; Roh et al. 2015; Scheufele and Krause 2019).
However, the fear is that through algorithmic selection of online content consistent
with peoples’ pre-existing views and opinions (creating a filter bubble) or increas-
ingly homogeneous connections with like-minded individuals online (creating an
echo chamber) (Flaxman et al. 2016), polarisation could be enhanced, particularly
around controversial scientific issues (Scheufele and Krause 2019). However, re-
search on filter bubbles and echo chambers in the context of science is only emer-
ging. Studies in the context of political communication have shed doubt on the
extent to which filter bubbles and echo chambers may actually exist (Bruns 2019;
Flaxman et al. 2016; Garrett 2009, 2017). Nonetheless, particularly with regard to
contested issues such as climate change or vaccination, studies analyse to what extent
counterpublics emerge and are organised online and thus, possibly, contribute to a
polarisation of the online debate on climate change (Häussler 2019; Kaiser 2017;
Kaiser and Puschmann 2017). Such studies reveal that climate or vaccination sceptics
can form counterpublics in the online public sphere and are quite isolated from the
mainstream (Kaiser and Puschmann 2017; Schmidt et al. 2018). They also demon-
strate that Twitter communication about climate change (Williams et al. 2015) or
Facebook communication about vaccination (Schmidt et al. 2018) is indeed struc-
tured in opposing communities that rarely interact with each other (Schmidt et al.
2017). In addition, they demonstrate that vilification may take place between those
communities online (Brüggemann et al. 2020; Walter et al. 2018) and that they hold
and potentially deepen polarised opinions when encountering dissenting views
(Centola 2010; Zollo et al. 2017). In sum, this suggests that even though audience
fragmentation and polarisation may be overestimated in public communication
generally, they may exist in online communication around science-related issues.

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However, as Schmid-Petri et al. (2019) point out, such constellations of publics and
counterpublics can also change over time.

Conclusions
Audiences are a crucial part of science communication, and therefore, scholarly
analyses of these audiences are highly important. As this overview has shown, there is
a large body of scholarship concerned with audiences, aiming to grasp them con-
ceptually and/or to analyse them empirically. Although this research has gaps and
biases – such as a strong focus on Anglophone countries, or on controversial issues
such as climate change or vaccination – several points can be derived from it.
The rising number of segmentation studies has shown that plural audiences exist
for science communication, which differ in their views of science in general or of
specific science-related issues in particular, as well as in their topical information use
and media diets. Efforts to describe such audiences further, ideally with more stan-
dardised instruments and a clearer theoretical foundation and potentially using novel
measures like tracking data or behavioural traces (cf. Füchslin 2019), would be useful
to track audience separations and characteristics over time. When doing so, indica-
tions of fragmentation and polarisation should be taken into account specifically and
modelled via longitudinal or panel studies. Even though ‘echo chambers’ and ‘filter
bubbles’ may be less pronounced on political topics, research on online and social
media communication about climate change and vaccination has yielded some
troubling findings, and more evidence is needed on these as well as other science-
related issues. Moreover, such empirical findings should be connected conceptually
and empirically to phenomena such as mis- or disinformation (Scheufele and Krause
2019), the rise of alternative epistemologies among audiences challenging science
(e.g., Harambam and Aupers 2015), or the emergence of ‘science-related populism’
(Mede and Schäfer 2020). Also, potential changes in science communication audiences
fuelled by critical events with strong societal implications – such as the Covid-19
pandemic – should be analysed and integrated in future research.
The same is true for the potential practical implications of these findings. Defining
target audiences is an important part of science communication work and campaigns.
Research can characterise these target audiences, show how they differ in their views,
interest or trust in science, what communicative aims may be realistic among them,
which channels and messages might be used to realise them – and how they change
over time. Therefore, work on science communication audiences has the potential
for a close collaboration between science communication research and practice.

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