Thursday, July 30, 2015

Subunit Meeting 7/23/15, "Don't Be Such a Scientist"

Last week, our student subunit met and discussed a chapter from Dr. Randy Olson's "Don't be Such a Scientist." Several members had read the book in its entirety or were familiar with its teachings through exposure during undergraduate.  Some of our subunit members had even met Dr. Olson and seen his documentary "Flock of Dodos" when it was presented at William and Mary. It has been praised by science and news outlets alike for pointing out the similarities between the film narrative and the story scientists need to be telling to lay audiences in order to engage and educate most effectively.  The chapter we read was titled "Don't be So Unlikable" which specifically addressed how to toe the line between optimism and pessimism, and how to stay positive in such a critical field.  Negativity gets attention, gets press.  Bloggers who rant and curse and condemn something will get much more web traffic than the equivalent blogger who promotes and lauds.  Conflict and anger is inherently interesting, and it is our jobs as young scientists to find a way to communicate our messages while still staying upbeat.

We started by discussing how best to "tell a story" with your research.  The the story's conflict in any research project is trying to puzzle together some inherent truth and either confirm or refute your hypothesis.  The story's progression in detailing how you go about isolating this "truth" from all the "untruth," and any pitfalls along the way to your conclusion.  And the reward, the happy or sad ending of the tale, is some new piece of information that benefits humanity or forwards the progress of science.  So our progress as researchers is much the same as any story in a book or movie- there is an introduction, a conflict, and through struggle, an eventual resolution.

But even structuring our research in such a way does not necessarily mean it will be inherently interesting to the public, especially if it isn't conveyed in a way that others can understand.  It is critical to know how much or how little "jargon" to include.  Though it is essential to simplify our language, we shouldn't "dumb down" our material.  Matt Siskey noted that as science communicators, we should "start broad, not dumb" by describing our work in big sweeping terms but not treat the audience like they are infantile or stupid.  If the people are still interested, you can gradually narrow the focus until you get at the heart and details of your work.  As long as you explain what each of the "jargon" terms are in a simple and respectful way, and don't throw them out willy-nilly to display your knowledge and ability and charge right through with your description, people will be more receptive to the message.  Suzan Shahrestani pointed out that she had the opposite problem when working in Jordan because of a language barrier.  She was having to mentally translate her research in an unfamiliar language, so she didn't necessarily have the vocabulary to increase the complexity of her communication!

The discussion then shifted into a consideration for the optimism/pessimism spectrum and when each of these attitudes is important in the scientific process.  Assistant Research Scientist Andre Buchheister described how he fluctuates between these approaches throughout his research.  When brainstorming, keep an open mind and don't strike any ideas from the ledger.  But when it comes down to brass tax and putting those ideas into practice, it's important to be critical, practical, and a little pessimistic.  After all, it's a scientists job to question and doubt.

Source: Fast Company
But more important than that, we need to extend this positivity to our fellow scientists.  Hillary Lane pointed to a section in the book chapter where Dr. Olson describes the unfortunate outcome of a real graduate student who prematurely ended her degree because she was so disheartened by the repeated scathing criticism of a notoriously harsh senior scientist.  Being a jerk in a field as small  as Fisheries Sciences will solidify your reputation as such, and will ultimately result in fewer collaborations and engagements.  Establish rapport, said the subunit's newest member, Matt Damiano.  Don't passively attend meetings and conferences, try to engage, promote, praise, and ultimately be genuinely likable.

So we finished up the meeting with some take-home nuggets of wisdom: be sensitive and considerate of other people's ideas and research.  Don't yell over others or try to get your message heard by drowning others out.  Engage, discuss, educate.  Those will be the keys to disseminating our findings to fellow researchers, the wider public, and critics alike.  By doing this, we might do Dr. Olson proud and not be quite such scientists.

A sample of the book can be found here, courtesy of NPR: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=113832764

We're still thinking about what we'll be reading/discussing in two months time.  But we'll likely go back to a primary scientific article.  Please don't hesitate to leave suggestions in the message section below.

Thursday, July 23, 2015

The CBL Seine Survey

            Working at Chesapeake Biological Lab (CBL), near the mouth of the Patuxent River, a lot of us tend to look out onto the water and wonder what kinds of animals are hanging out in our backyard. Luckily, some of us get the opportunity to regularly wade into the water to catch, count and measure the fish and invertebrates that inhabit the shallows around CBL’s research pier. For the past 16 years, Dr. Dave Secor’s lab has been conducting a seine survey in these waters once a week from May through October, where they document the abundance and size distributions of almost every species they catch. When the survey begins in early May, the water is typically just starting to warm up and fish and invertebrates are waking up after a long winter. The shallow habitat usually remains productive until mid-October, when the temperature begins to drop and many species move to deeper waters to overwinter. The survey is designed to include this period of warm temperature and peak abundance in the summer and fall, with the hope that the collection of species (also called an assemblage) that we observe over this time period can tell us something about how environmental conditions influence this assemblage each year.
Matt Siskey and Alex Atikinson of the Secor lab hauling in a big school of thrashing Atlantic menhaden caught in the seine survey
            Typically, many people expect that environmental conditions in the summer and fall, particularly the temperature, freshwater flow, salinity and wind will have the biggest influence on our summer-fall fish assemblage. Interestingly, that doesn’t appear to be the case. Winter conditions, especially temperature and flow, largely determine the species composition and abundance of the assemblage that we see in the subsequent summer and fall. In years with cool, wet winters (low temperature, high flow), we will typically see higher abundances of Atlantic silversides, Atlantic needlefish, juvenile striped bass and my personal favorite (see my earlier post), juvenile white perch. Conversely, in years with warmer and drier winters, we observe relatively high numbers of bluefish, spot, bay anchovy and northern pufferfish. The importance of winter conditions suggests that the productivity of the Patuxent River may be “preconditioned” during this time period, which would indirectly affect our fish assemblage. In addition, winter conditions can influence the timing of migration and reproduction in many fishes and invertebrates. These phenomena have been documented in other fish assemblages in other estuaries. However, these effects would have remained hidden in the Patuxent River if it weren’t for the CBL seine survey, started on a whim in the spring of 1999 and continued through the present day. It just goes to show how valuable this type of continuous monitoring can be for gaining insight, however small, into the processes affecting the animals in our backyard.
Dr. Dave Secor showing off some of our catch from the seine survey to passers-by.

            If you’re curious about the Secor Lab’s seine survey, you can find more information in this paper by Dr. Secor and his former technician, Becca Wingate. Or, you can follow us on twitter (@SecorLab), and look up some of our previous posts by searching #inseine!
This pretty fish, a young-of-the-year spotted seatrout is a rare find in the seine survey. We’ve only caught 13 individuals over the entire 16-year period!