5 February 2021
Even for full-time researchers it is not easy to keep up-to-date. But the journals aim to make it easier by sending out email alerts to new content and through social media.
Science communication practitioners, teachers and researchers all potentially have an interest in the research literature in this field. Much of this appears in books, mostly edited collections with multiple authors. But a steady stream is published in academic journals – indeed, the number of such papers increases every year.
Even for full-time researchers it is not easy to keep up-to-date with all of this. But the journals aim to make it easier by sending out email alerts to new content and through social media. For the guidance of those interested in science communication developments, here is a listing of publicity services of some of the journals most strongly concentrated on our field. These six journals were invited to a PCST webinar in October 2020.
Environmental Communication is published in partnership with the International Environmental Communication Association (IECA), which includes a subscription to the journal as part of their membership package. Some of the journal’s content is published open access. The IECA’s Facebook page and Twitter feed <@TheIECA> include updates on the journal’s content. You can subscribe for email alerts directly from the journal here.
Frontiers in Science and Environmental Communication is a section within the open-access online journal, Frontiers in Communication, itself party of the larger group of Frontiers publications. Sign up for article alerts from the science and environmental communication section here and follow the broader activity in communication @FrontComm.
JCOM – Journal of Science Communication is published open-access online by SISSA, a research and graduate education centre in Trieste, Italy. Publication in JCOM is free of charge to the authors; in other cases of open-access publishing authors may face a publishing charge. JCOM is found in social media @JsciCOM and on Facebook. JCOM has a sister publication, JCOM América Latina, which appears in Spanish and Portuguese.
Public Understanding of Science has been publishing since 1992 on science communication and on science in society more broadly. Most of its content is accessible only to those with subscriptions but a small part, including all book reviews, appears open-access. The journal also has a blog, where short essays and summaries of research papers published in the journal may be found. The journal’s Twitter feed @SciPublic carries information on new papers. An alert service and RSS Feeds can be accessed here.
Research For All is one of a family of open-access journals published by University College London. Its focus is on research impact and engagement with and through research, but some content more directly addresses science communication. Authors face no publishing charge in publishing here open-access. Sign-up to mailing list alerts is at the journal’s web home page and updates are also available to the publisher’s Twitter account @UCLPress
Science Communication evolved from a journal called Knowledge and addresses topics of expertise and knowledge in society as well as science communication. Like Public Understanding of Science it is published by Sage, a publisher with a longstanding specialism in social and communication studies. The journal’s presence on Twitter @SageMedia_comm is shared with other Sage publications. The sign-up for email alerts and RSS Feeds is here.
