Science can be one of the most intimidating and yet one of the most interesting areas to cover, according to the writing coach of the Dallas Morning News.
Paula LaRocque told a Canadian Association of Journalists conference that science is the field moving most quickly, with new information appearing almost daily. He said science “is an important part of our world, it will certainly affect us greatly tomorrow.”
“We need to interpret that (as a newspaper) so that we will on the one hand not offend our sources by being, what they think, shallow or superficial or in some times even distorting the information, and still make it acceptable enough so that a lay reader will not fear getting into that story.”
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LaRocque said this is a challenge for science stories and can be applicable to other areas of news.
She defined the role of media: “We’re supposed to be a translator, an interpreter between something that’s probably obscure and something that is extremely simple and accessible to a reader that doesn’t have specialized knowledge.”
She advised reporters to go back to their sources and state what the reporter thinks the source is saying.
Explain that while the writer is trying to keep to the concept, a lot of the source’s language won’t be used and will probably be simplified.
It’s important to ask the right questions of the source. Instead of asking what something is, ask what it looks like, how it works, how big it is.
LaRocque said this leads the source to start describing instead of defining.
“If you ask the right questions, they will give you absolutely wonderful, usable answers. … they’ll give you comparisons and examples and analogies, they’ll give you metaphors.”
This ultimately leads to a more interesting story for readers.
