SN 4 EP 11: Bridging Science and Society Through Science Communication with Prof. Marina Joubert

How can science communication strengthen public trust and engagement with science in Africa?

In this episode, we explore the evolving role of science communication in Africa and how researchers and communicators can build stronger connections between science and society.

Our host Joy Owango sits down with Prof. Marina Joubert, a leading science communication scholar and associate professor at Stellenbosch University, South Africa. Drawing on more than 20 years of experience, she discusses the importance of visible scientists, building public trust, addressing misinformation and disinformation, and adapting global science communication approaches to African realities.

Find out more about Prof. Marina Joubert and her work in science communication through LinkedIn.

Here are the key things to look out for:

Building Science Communication Capacity Across Africa
Dr. Marina Joubert reflects on the evolution of science communication in Africa, from a field that was barely established to one now offered through accredited university programmes in South Africa. She highlights the need for continued capacity building—not only for scientists seeking to communicate their work better, but also for professional science communicators and researchers in the field.

Humanizing Science to Build Public Trust
The conversation explores why scientists need to move beyond purely objective and technical communication. By showing empathy, telling stories, acknowledging uncertainty, and bringing their own human perspectives into the conversation, scientists can build stronger connections with the public and foster greater trust in science.
Moving Beyond Information to Meaningful Public Engagement
Dr. Joubert challenges the idea that simply giving people scientific facts is enough to change minds or behaviour. Effective science communication requires scientists to identify their objectives and audiences, listen to public concerns, and take lived experiences, values, culture, and identity into account. Engagement becomes a two-way process rather than simply communicating information to the public.

Making Science Communication Relevant to African Contexts
Global science communication frameworks and resources can provide valuable lessons, but they cannot simply be copied and applied across Africa. Dr. Joubert emphasizes adapting approaches to local realities and involving communities from the beginning of research through co-creation and listening. Context, she argues, should shape how science is communicated and engaged with.

Embedding Science Communication in Research Systems
For science communication to become a meaningful part of research culture, it needs institutional and structural support. Dr. Joubert calls for policymakers, funders, and universities to formally recognize, incentivize, fund, and reward communication and public engagement, while also employing professional science communicators to support researchers.

Giving Science a Voice in the Public Conversation
The conversation closes with a powerful message to researchers: good science does not speak for itself. Scientists need to find their voice, identify the audiences who can benefit from their work, and participate in public conversations—particularly when misinformation and anti-science narratives are competing for public attention.

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Intro:

Welcome to Mazumgumzo – African scholarly conversations, a podcast that highlights the perspectives of various stakeholders in academia and research fields across Africa through open dialogue on mazungumzo on scholarly communication in Africa.

Joy Owango 

Welcome to Mazungumzo, African Scholarly Conversations platform that brings together African policymakers, researchers, science communication specialists, innovators, and university leaders who contribute to strengthening research and knowledge systems across the continent. I’m your host, Joy Owango, the Executive Director of the Training Center in Communication, also known as TCC Africa, Capacity Building Trust, based at the University of Nairobi, Faculty of Science, Technology and Innovation, Kenya.

Today, I’m honored to be joined by one of Africa’s most respected voices in science communication and public engagement, Dr. Marina Joubert is a science communication professional with more than 20 years of experience, combining science communication and academic research. She’s an associate professor at the Center for Research on Evaluation Science and Technology (CREST) at Stellenbosch University in South Africa and contributes to public science discourse through platforms such as the Conversation Africa. She is also an honorary member of the Public Communication of Science and Technology Network in recognition of her work in advancing global science communication. Her work focuses on the realities of science communication in African context, particularly the cultural and socio-economic factors that shape how science is shared, understood, and discussed. She also examines the growing challenges of misinformation and disinformation with a strong emphasis on how these issues affect public trust in science across South Africa and beyond.

Professor Marina Joubert, it is a pleasure to have you on Mazungumzo, welcome.

Dr. Marina Joubert 

Thank you very much, Joy. It’s always a special opportunity for me to talk about science communication because it’s so close to my heart.

Joy Owango

Thank you so much for joining us. So now, to begin with, what experiences have shaped your career and perspective on science communication in Africa?

Dr. Marina Joubert 

Well, Joy, when I set out to study after school, my early university studies were focused on science. From the beginning, I knew that I didn’t want to build my career in the lab. I wanted to share science with society. At that time, that’s many years ago, science communication as a field of practice and especially as a field of study didn’t really exist yet in South Africa and also I think, in the rest of Africa it was still very very, much in its infancy.

Of course we did have science journalism but not so much science communication, and so I enrolled for a one year course in science journalism at Stellenbosch University and that combination of having studied science, then science journalism opened the door for me to say, I’m here. I want to communicate about science. At the time, it was the 80s and the 90s. Science communication were also blossoming and developing around the world, especially in the UK. They really took the lead with policy reports about the importance of linking science and society, and so I also found that, when I started talking about science communication and doing presentations about it, so many young people came to me afterwards and said, “This is so interesting and so fascinating and so important. We’d love to study this. Where do we study this?” This was something that I knew we had to find a way to start an academic program in science communication in the continent. Well, starting with my own country, South Africa, but also broader than that, so that young people could also, get professional qualifications in this field.

So, about 10 years ago, in 2015, I had the opportunity to come to Stellenbosch University and start an accredited program. Now it’s about 11 years later, I’m glad to say that science communication is now on offer at least four universities in South Africa that I know of, and there are many more that offer informal courses. We do have university accredited training for science communication and professional careers in science communication at least four universities in South Africa. I think we’ve got a long way to go, but the field is growing, and there’s some signs that young people really want to know more about this.

Joy Owango

Oh, okay! It’s really nice to see the growth you’ve had ever since, when you started 11 years ago, because one of the things you did was that, you pioneered one of Africa’s first online science communication training course through your consultancy then Southern Science, and of course this has now grown to, now seeing accredited training programs within the university. That is such a lovely trajectory and positive trajectory on how science communication has been adopted within the universities.

Now, with this in mind, what gaps were you hoping to address at that time, and how has science communication capacity evolved across Africa since then, picking up on the four universities that have adopted science communication?

Dr. Marina Joubert 

I think when we talk about science communication training, it’s important to remember broadly speaking, there are two kinds of training: There’s training for scientists who are already scientists and they want to remain in science, but they want to become better communicators at the same time, they want to share their work more effectively with society. Then there’s another kind of training where you’ve got young people from different backgrounds, some from science, but some from languages, some from you know, media studies, etc., who are interested to become professional science communicators. So I am passionate about both kinds of training.

The training for scientists, are usually short courses, sometimes a day, sometimes a few days or a week. You know, the kind of training that we offer? But when you want to help people to almost make a career out of science communication, then you need something more substantial. You really need to introduce them to the theory and the practice of science communication, and I feel very passionate about these professional science communicators because for me they are the catalysts. They are the ones that really build the bridges between science and society and help scientists to engage better. Sometimes they are almost like the unsung heroes of science communication. We don’t often know their names or see them, but they make things happen.

Then there’s another role as well; Its training young people who want to do research in science communication, who want to become academics. Now, I think across all three of those, with organizations like your own, and with my efforts, and with other universities getting involved, we are seeing a growth, but at the same time, I think we have to acknowledge that as a continent, Africa still lags behind. One of the roles that I fulfill at the moment, is deputy editor of the Journal of Science Communication, and we see in this journal, but also in other journals in the field, that we still don’t get many research papers, for example, from African researchers in the field, even practice insights. We are growing this good and encouraging science, but I think we really all of us collectively have got a job to do to make young scientists aware of this field, to make communicators aware of this field, to build bridges between science communication and communication science. I feel quite passionately about that as well. I think we can benefit a lot by learning more from and involving communication scholars into how communication works and how to communicate science more effectively.

So capacity building will remain a key challenge for the foreseeable future, but it is an ongoing challenge, and it’s nice to see young people, if I supervise masters and PhD students who are interested in becoming also researchers in this field.

Joy Owango

I think also what I’ve also observed is that more scientists have a positive outlook towards science communication, and they’re trusting the process in getting involved in science communication with them contributing to some of these platforms like the conversation, Africa accepting to be interviewed in podcasts. There’s a paradigm shift on their outlook towards science communication, and I think that is the practical side of it. But as you say, there is still need for more research to be done on it, such that it’s just not only the practical aspect that we only rely on when it comes to science communication. Am I right?

Dr. Marina Joubert 

You are so correct. Yes, and of course, this is something that has always fascinated me. Why are some scientists’ natural communicators? They love to engage with society. They will do it even if they don’t have funding for it. They will find a way to do it, they are good storytellers. They are passionate about sharing their science with society, and then on the other hand, you get the scientists that kind of really don’t want to do it. They kind of hide away, and then in the middle, you have, most scientists who know it’s important, but maybe they are uncertain about it. They are maybe worried about some of the risks, and they need some help.

So when we talk about training and helping and equipping scientists with the skills and confidence to do this. I think that middle group is the most important. I don’t think that we should force the ones who absolutely don’t want to do it, and the ones who are natural communicators, they don’t really need our help. They are doing it in any case. So it’s that middle group that we want to work with. I think when we talk about science communication. It’s also important to acknowledge that yes, there are benefits for you as a scientist to do it in your career. There are many well-documented studies about how it can benefit your academic impact, your policy impact, how you can get more funding, all these things that can really advance your career, but we also have to acknowledge that there are some risks in today’s world, and it’s good to know about these risks. It’s good to anticipate them. It’s very important to plan for them when you go public with your work, so that you can maximize the benefits and minimize the risks hopefully.

Joy Owango

Okay, all right then. So your research has explored the concept of visible scientists and the role researchers play in public discourse. Why does visibility matter, and what barriers prevent more scientists from engaging with the public?

Dr. Marina Joubert 

So I became very interested in this concept of highly visible scientists. Scientists that almost can be a kind of scientific celebrities. There are not too many of them. There are a few, household names in science around the world. We also saw this during COVID, especially in many countries, how some scientists really rose to the occasion and became like the public voice of science. But, then there are scientists who are fairly visible, but not maybe the level of a celebrity. So I’ve always been really interested in the role of scientists because I acknowledge that there are of course many role players. Journalists are important, filmmakers, institutional communicators. There are many role players, but, if you think about it, and in my view, the scientists themselves are central because they are the owners of the new knowledge. They are the ones that we have to go to, to be interviewed, and so, when you think about these visible scientists who become like public faces of science, they actually play a very important role in society. They are the ones that can really shape public discourse about science. They can nurture public trust in science. They can influence science policy. So I think it’s important to study them to see, why they become so visible and how they communicate. What is it that they do really well?

During COVID, I specifically looked in South Africa, at Professor Salim Abdul Karim, who became a really well-known face of science in the country during that time. It was fascinating for me to see how human he was in his approach, how he was willing to address uncertainty, how he told stories, how he empathized with people about the difficulties they were facing. He was not an arrogant, top-down communicator. He was really connecting with people on an emotional level, and I think that’s part of the reason why he was so successful and why journalists keep on going back to him for interviews. I think you know that’s only one example. I’ve done some studies about these visible scientists and what makes them visible and what makes them successful, so that we can learn from that.

Joy Owango

I think you’ve said the right thing, that when they humanize the process, to a certain degree they empathize, not sympathize. They empathize with the audience, and they become part. They gel with the audience, so it becomes easy for them to connect with them. So what I’ve noted is that unfortunately sometimes scientists are disconnected with the audience, they do not connect their work to the realities of the day or the week when they are being interviewed. So there is no way a lay person can, it’s not an issue of understanding, can connect with what they are seeing with what they are saying. There is no way as a layperson can see their agency or understand their urgency, unless now, there is a huge problem like the pandemic, because now all of a sudden we are listening. But on what I emphasize is that you don’t have to wait for a pandemic to happen for us as scientists to know how to communicate with an audience, we need to.

One of the first things we need to do is we humanize the process as we are talking to them, and we also need to empathize with the audience such that they can see our urgency and why we need to share this work.

Dr. Marina Joubert 

And you know, Joy, in many ways, this showing of empathy and making it more human, making it more personal, is the opposite of what scientists are taught to do and trained to do as scientists, where they’re taught to be very objective and cold and neutral. So it kind of requires of young scientists and and scientists at any level really when they engage with public and policy audiences to make a shift in their minds and to become a human being to bring themselves into the story to share with their audience why this is important, why they are concerned, what are their hopes for the future and if they can do that, they can make that connection with the audience and people are much more likely to respond and to trust them and to engage, and something that I’m also really fascinated in is, why do we communicate science? Thinking about objectives, and at the moment there’s an interesting debate that I’ve been following about, it is about convincing people, persuading people to trust science and to like science, or is it also about empowering them to make critical choices for themselves, also being more honest and more transparent about science’s shortcomings. I think, of course, it is a combination of both, but there’s interesting research that shows, if scientists are open about uncertainty and very transparent and admit what they don’t know, actually builds trust. I think often scientists think I have to I have to know all the facts. I have to be certain about everything. I have to show them that I’m really an expert, but it’s not what the research tells us. The research tells us that being more human about it, being more open about your own uncertainties, which is what Professor Karim did, that really builds trust and allows people to really understand what you’re talking about.

Joy Owango

That’s true. So now, in your essay, the conflation of motives of science communication, you explore how education, engagement, and promotion overlap in science communication. How does this affect practice today and what does it mean for public trust in science?

Dr. Marina Joubert 

So it connects a little bit to what we’ve already been discussing. We really need to think about, the objectives. Why are we doing this? There are two key things that I believe scientists should think about before they communicate is; what am I trying to do? Yeah, what do I want to achieve? Then, sort of very closely linked to that, who are the most important audiences that are affected by my work? Because we can’t engage with everybody, we have to prioritize the audiences. Only then you decide, what you’re going to do. Very often, scientists start with “Let’s produce a poster” or “Let’s do an exhibition, but they haven’t really thought about what they want to achieve and who they want to reach, so it’s super important. Then of course a third question linked to all of that is, how will I know whether I’ve been successful? What can I do to gather some evidence and do it better over time?

There’s a big debate about the balance between educating the public, like just giving them information versus engaging them, also listening to public input, but I think once again these things exist on a continuum. Everything we do when we make science visible, will have elements of promotion and education and information giving, but the important thing is not to just stop there, but to also really think about how can I also listen to the public? We know that listening is a key component of trust building as well. How can I get public input? It requires a bit of humility on the side of scientists to say, okay, you know, I’ve worked in this field for many years, I’ve studied long years, but I can still benefit from listening to the public, from hearing their concerns and their views, and this is what public engagement, of course, is all about. It links to this idea of the science of science communication, where we know that simply giving people information, yes, it’s important. I’m not saying it’s not important, and of course, facts and evidence are important, but if we simply assume that giving people facts will convince them and will change their behavior, I think then we are on dangerous ground. So we have to provide the information, we have to give the facts, but we also have to keep in mind that everything we tell our public audiences will be filtered through their own experiences, their own views, their own values, their own systems of looking at the world, the culture, everything.

Therefore, we cannot simply assume that they will believe everything we tell them, or that they will trust everything we tell them. That is why listening is also more acknowledged as a key part of science, effective science engagement, and we have to look what the research tells us here is that, the messenger is very, very important. It’s very important not to threaten people’s identities when you engage with them. It’s very important to take into account their own lived experiences, and it all comes down to trust building. The facts are important, but facts alone are kind of cold. We have to add that emotional layer where we connect through listening, through showing that you care, through storytelling, through making it personal.

Joy Owango

Okay, so how do you see the relationship between global science communication frameworks and the realities of public engagement in South Africa, and any similar context?

Dr. Marina Joubert  19:28

Right. So over the years, I’ve really been hugely blessed in the sense that I’ve been able to travel abroad and engage with people around the world, and attend conferences and listen to what science communication practitioners and researchers are doing in other parts of the world. I have benefited enormously from that. I have found that the community is very generous; they’re willing to share materials with you, even full curricula and things that you can do with your own students but when you come home to your own office, anywhere on the African continent, you’ll find that those materials are useful, but you cannot just copy and paste them to our local context, because countries in Africa, we have our own challenges. We have high levels of inequality, we have poverty, we have different kinds of diseases, and so we have to we have to listen and engage with the international community. I think that’s very beneficial, but we have to make sure that we adjust the materials to our local context. Also, these days, science communication are really taking off in other developed regions of the world, specifically in Latin America and in Southeast Asia. I think we can also learn a great deal from those countries. At the moment, for example, I’m supervising a PhD student in Vietnam, and it’s so fascinating to me to find out about science communication in Vietnam and how they’re doing it. I see more similarities between South Africa and Vietnam than with countries in Europe, for example.

Joy Owango

Yeah

Dr. Marina Joubert 

So I think this is important, and then maybe one last thing is, of course, it links again to this idea of co-creation with communities. You can take your ideas and go into your own local communities and test your ideas for them and hear what they have to say, and that will really enrich your research. It’s not something that you do at the end of the research. It’s something that you do almost right at the beginning and throughout your research project.

Joy Owango

Interesting, because you see, we are working on a project with IES Research based out of Singapore, and when you mentioned Asia, one of the things we observed in that partnership is, how aggressive Asia is in science communication and knowledge translation, particularly in making sure that their work is accessible beyond the scholarly community, the traditional scholarly community.

You’re seeing them actively working with the communications offices, and also with the scientists in preparing and conducting interviews on how also even something as simple as press releases, trying to make sure that their research is as accessible as possible and also interacting with the community.One of the things I’ve noted is that, the reason why we’re also seeing this in Asia is because of the high competitiveness of the higher education sector. So there are so many parameters that are used to measure the competitiveness and visibility and outreach is one of the things that are factored. I feel that science communication is a means to an end, also for them at that level, because it has been taken up quite fast. We, as compared to, as you say in Africa, they are more open to talk about their research, share their findings, engage the communities, because it is being encouraged also by their respective governments, so that is also something that we’re seeing change.

Also, I don’t think all hope is lost because when we look at our current Ministry of Education, one of the priorities in the State Department of Science, Technology, and Innovation in Kenya is science translation and science communication, that is priority number one. So, if you have a government that is also pushing for it, I think this is where you’re seeing, there are more realities on how to engage the public when it comes to sharing information on our scientific output. So, I think all hope is not lost, but we are seeing some really good, we are seeing some promise, some promising responses, and promising and positive responses also on the continent. Yeah.

Dr. Marina Joubert  23:54

but Joy, this also touches on an important debate that, I think is worth just mentioning, and that is, when institutions like universities, for example, use science communication to promote themselves, to build their profile, to build their reputation, to bring funding. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that. You know, they use the achievements of their staff, of their researchers, to tell the world about this is a great university. These are all the things we are doing, through press releases, etc. As long as you do it ethically and as long as you don’t overhype the findings, that’s fine. I think it’s completely acceptable and good. It makes the science visible. We need that, but it also raises a question whether universities have another role to play in terms of encouraging dialog with society, not necessarily promoting science, so that’s something important to think about.

Encouraging where the concentration of motives come in, and the other thing that I want to agree with you is,there are in addition to the institutions themselves, the universities, there are two other big influences on whether scientists are willing to engage. The one is the policies. If you have a strong government and political support for science communication, of course, that gives it legitimacy. It means that scientists can say, according to the white paper or according to the act of this and this, I am supposed to engage with society so you’ve got to give me time and funding to do it.

Then also the funders. This is a big and important one. When research funders call for science communication and public engagement in their funding calls, and when they demand it in their reporting structures, it suddenly becomes no longer a nice to have, but a must do for the scientists, and it also becomes suddenly central to the project. Now, at the moment, we see a lot of evidence that funders are calling more and more for this. What we don’t yet see so much is that, it’s actually followed through. Very often, funders will call for science communication and engagement, but they don’t really penalize the scientists if they don’t do it. If you understand what I say, it’s it’s they will still get the funding, but we are getting there. I think these funders can really shape this to a large extent, and I think we should really work with funders more to have ring fence grants that are specifically for communication and engagement. The money shouldn’t be part of the research part; it should be separate so that they must use it for communication and engagement.

Joy Owango

That is true. So, finally, looking across your research and practice, what do you see as the most urgent shift needed in science communication to strengthen trust and public engagement in South Africa and globally?

Dr. Marina Joubert

I think to come back to my view that scientists that are actively engaged in research are key players in science communication and building public trust in science. I think we need a new generation of young scientists who embrace it, who see it as a part of their duty, as a part of their identity as a scientist, not as an afterthought, optional thing to do if I feel like it one day. So, to achieve this, I really think it’s super important to work with policymakers and funders and institutions to make sure that science communication and engagement are encouraged, incentivized, recognized, and rewarded by these institutions and funders. It must really be formalized. It mustn’t just be something that they say is important. They must show that it’s important through their calling, their funding mechanisms and their reporting mechanisms. I think that way it will become fully integrated and rewarded into scientists’ careers on par with their academic work.

At the same time, we also have to recognize that scientists are under pressure. They have a lot on their plate. So, I think universities and other research institutions can go a long way by, employing professional science communicators, whose role and job it is to help these scientists, and also, to because we can’t expect scientists to be filmmakers and translators and editors and writers and social media experts, that’s where the professional science communicators come in. They can help you know with the social media, with the illustrations, with the infographics, all those important things. With this connection of training and support, but also formal recognition in the funding and promotion mechanisms is what we need.

If you will allow me, I’d like to maybe end with something very quickly. Think about this. If I ask young scientists and senior scientists, why did you study science? Why did you become a researcher? Usually, almost always, the answer is something like, “I wanted to help people. I wanted to solve some problems. I wanted to improve people’s lives, and my message to scientists is, if you really want to do that, it’s not enough to publish in academic journals and go to academic conferences, because that’s not going to reach the people that really can use your work. You have to give your science a voice. You must make it visible and accessible, but meaningful and relevant to specific audiences. You shouldn’t maybe try to reach everyone, but really focus on the audiences that can benefit from your work. This may look different for different scientists. Some people are confident and happy to go in front of cameras. Others prefer to write behind the scenes for a platform like the conversation, participating in a podcast like we are today, you don’t even have to be, on the screen. You can just use your voice.

So I always say to young scientists, find your niche and find your voice and find the place that you are comfortable to do it because good science is fantastic and important, but good science does not speak for itself, especially when the science is complex and uncertain and risky or controversial. We need researchers to participate in the public debate, and one thing that scientists often ask me is, “What about all the misinformation and disinformation and anti-science voices out there? I don’t want to be part of that dialog,” Then I say to them, if you are not part of that conversation, then the only voices that the public will hear will be the ones who are anti-science and who don’t trust science, and therefore, even if sometimes it feels a bit hopeless, we have to be part of that dialog. You have to come forward with the scientist perspective. Be the change you want to be. You can’t just sit back and say, I can’t make a difference. You can make a difference, and collectively, certainly, we can make a big difference.

Joy Owango

Fantastic, and that’s a really nice way to wind up. Thank you so much, Marina, and thank you for being part of our podcast.

Dr. Marina Joubert

It was wonderful to talk to you, Joy. I really enjoyed this conversation and also hear your inputs, of course. Okay,

Joy Owango

Okay bye for now.

Dr. Marina Joubert

Thank you. Bye bye.

Listen to the full episode here:

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