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Asked by on 7 Jul 2020. This question was also asked by .
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Helen Roy answered on 7 Jul 2020:
It has been wonderful to have lots of interest in some of my research findings – of course not all. Some findings are just small parts of a much bigger jigsaw and they can pass by mostly unnoticed (but they still excite me!) but others get lots of interest in the media and from other people. The work I have been involved with on the Asian hornet gets lots of news interest – it’s wonderful to be able to share findings with many different people from other scientists to policy-makers and school groups and societies – indeed everyone!
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Maryam Masood answered on 7 Jul 2020:
My aspiration when I started a PhD was to do work that can affect people’s lives directly and I was luck to be able to do that. My work in waste management in developing countries got a lot of recognition from the city that I used as my case study. The framework I developed to include informal waste workers in the formal waste management system was taken up by the city government and tested on a small part of the city. It gave me immense pleasure to see my reserach being applied.
I work in the area of circular economy now and I see alot of interest from not only the reserach community and practitioners but from the general public as well which motivates me to work even harder.
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Laura Hunt answered on 7 Jul 2020:
Hi Maryami, thanks for your question! I have had a good response to my research findings so far – local villagers living near the lakes I am researching are really interested in what I have found out, and even cooked us lunch one day in the field! I also collaborate with the Ugandan Wildlife Authority to let them know how they can update their management practises to benefit the lakes best – we visit them every year on fieldwork. We are also hoping to collaborate with the forestry commission there, as we met someone on fieldwork who works for them, and is interested in our work. I am very lucky to have great collaborations with our partners in Uganda.
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anon answered on 16 Jul 2020:
Sometimes you get deafening silence, but that shouldn’t discourage you. YOu keep going.
Comments
Melanie commented on :
Thats such a lovely question!!
For me it depends a lot on who I am talking to about my science. When I break it down for school visits or public engagement most people find my work really cool. When I talk to other scientists it depends a lot which field or specialty they are in… I work in the middle of two fields (virology and cell biology) so sometimes other researchers don’t know much about one of those things and don’t know what to make of my work.. I once had a very senior scientist ask me at a conference: ‘But how is that different from what was shown before?’ and he didn’t know the cell biology part of my work and why my findings add something very new to that cell biology part.