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Recent public engagement with science (PES) scholarship has discussed the importance of designing and implementing extrinsic reward systems to recognize the scientists involved in PES work and potentially induce further engagement. This study examines the perceptions of the applicants, finalists, and awardees of a prestigious PES award. Although the award is perceived highly by all three groups, we found that it only has major impacts on the careers and PES work of those who had actually won it. Upon winning, the awardees experience internal and external validation in the form of increased confidence, recognition from others, and further PES and career opportunities that would not have been available to them otherwise. The rest of the applicants perceived no direct or indirect benefits from applying to the award. Our results suggest that more sustainable and far-reaching reward systems should be designed in order to support and reward more publicly engaged scientists.

Scientific societies play an important role in scientists' career development and can have an impact on scientific advancement. The current study explores scientific societies' view of and support for public engagement. Interviews with key actors of 21 US-based scientific societies suggest that societies recognize the value of public engagement and outreach, and the emphasis has been steadily increasing. Depending on the membership size and discipline of the society, various types of engagement activities are supported and offered. We also explored potential challenges and opportunities for societies in supporting scientific engagement of the public. The current project aimed at providing an overview of the role of scientific societies to help identify ways to areas to enhance the allocation of resources to support public engagement and future research, including theory development.

The current study explores the degree to which two-way communication is applied in science communication contexts in North America, based on the experiences of science communication trainers. Interviews with 24 science communication trainers suggest that scientists rarely focus on applying two-way communication tactics, such as listening to their audiences or tailoring messages based on their audiences' needs. Also, although trainers generally recognize the value of two-way communication, it is seldom addressed in science communication trainings. The importance of two-way communication in fostering interactive dialogical communication between scientists and the public, and thus the importance of emphasizing it more during science communication training, is discussed.

This study explored the expectancies and motivations that prompt audiences to attend a university science lecture series. The series features talks by science experts from the host campus and around the USA. Each lecture typically attracts between 300 and 600 attendees, including middle and high school student groups, university students, and families and adults from the area. We conducted 47 semi-structured interviews with attendees in order to evaluate their expectancies and motivations. A template analysis of the interviews was grounded in social cognitive and self-determination theories. Results suggest that participants were mostly driven by intrinsic motivations and acquired strong sensory outcome expectancies, such as novelty and activity. Participants also held physical outcome expectancies, such as social expectancies, though to a lesser extent. Both intrinsic and extrinsic motivations to attend the lecture series were associated with expectancies held prior to the event. Of those expectancies, the novelty, entertainment, and social outcomes were dominant. Other noteworthy outcome expectancies include status and self-reactivity. Parents and teachers held outcome expectancies, not only for themselves, but also for their children and students who attended the talks with them.

This study assesses how scientists think about science communication training based on the argument that such training represents an important tool in improving the quality of interactions between scientists and the public. It specifically focuses on training related to five goals, including views about training to make science messages understandable, as well as attitude-focused training meant to build trust and credibility, to demonstrate that one listens to the public, to demonstrate that one cares about the public's views, and to frame messages to resonate with audiences' pre-existing values. The theory of planned behavior and procedural justice theory were used to identify potential predictors of views about training toward these goals. Results show that the scientists rate message comprehension and credibility most favorably and give their lowest rating to training related to framing. Regression analyses reveal that believing that public engagement can make a difference (external efficacy) and belief in the ethicality of specific goals were the best predictors of whether scientists saw value in goal-oriented training. The results suggest that communication trainers might benefit from emphasizing the effectiveness and ethicality of engagement activities if they want to attract scientists to communication training, and that more work may need to be done by professional organizations to help scientists consider the value of thinking about communication goals beyond the traditional focus on message comprehension.