10 best practice guidelines for reporting science & health stories

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Guidelines intended for use by newsrooms to ensure that the reporting of science and health stories is balanced and accurate.

• Format Texts
• Language/s English
• Target Audience Self-directed learning
• Duration 5-15 mins
• Difficulty Introductory

Key Concepts addressed

• 2-2b All fair comparisons and outcomes should be reported
• 3-2b Are you very different from the people studied?
• 2-3b Relative measures of effects can be misleading
• 1-2c Association is not the same as causation

Details

Above and beyond specific guidelines, familiarity with the technicalities and common pitfalls in science and health reporting is invaluable and every newsroom should aim to employ specialist science and health correspondents. Wherever possible the advice and skills of these specialists should be sought and respected on major, relevant stories; the guidelines below will be especially useful for editors and general reporters who are less familiar with how science works.

These guidelines, drawn up in consultation with scientists, science reporters, editors and sub editors, are intended for use by newsrooms to ensure that the reporting of science and health stories is balanced and accurate. They are not intended as a prescriptive checklist and of course shorter articles or NIBs will not be able to cover every point.

Science Media Centre
http://www.sciencemediacentre.org/