Christina Agapakis, Creative Director of Ginkgo Bioworks, and Sarah Spitz and Jordyn Lee, heads of the Life Sciences practice at Mission North, discuss science communication, the spread of misinformation, and science’s impact on the way people interact during a global health crisis.
Christina.
As we’ve faced the Covid-19 crisis over the last few months, we’ve watched science unfold in real time. The story coalescing among public health experts is that there’s no way to safely go back to school and work without a massive increase in our ability to test and track infections—that’s something we are redirecting our business to solve. But leading up to this juncture, there has been so much uncertainty around the risks of the virus, or when our economy will “return to normal.” To make sense of something that feels unknown or unbelievable, people start to tell stories about where the virus came from or who is to blame. As rumors and misinformation swell, these stories can become incredibly dangerous.
Sarah.
I agree, people are looking for something to hold onto right now, so they resist new evidence. In digital culture, likes and positive feedback are valuable currency. People don’t want to admit having shared misinformation, or that they’ve learned something and changed their point of view—especially if they already published it on Facebook. So they hang onto outdated or inaccurate information. It can feel easier to dig your heels in rather than say, “I was wrong.”
C.
That’s a good point. But I also think that it’s an issue of values. For most people, it’s not that they don’t believe in science per se, it’s that there are political and cultural phenomena that shape their values, and that impacts how they interpret facts. For example, how one believes we should respond to the coronavirus is impacted by who they believe benefits, their position in the economy, and who and what they value. These carry more weight than any epidemiological model. Values are how we move from facts into actions and that is actually what most people disagree on. I’m curious, how you are seeing the media act differently now, and how is that impacting widespread understanding or behavior shifts?
S.
Many reporters we talk to are required to have a coronavirus angle in their stories. But the constant reinforcement that everything is driven by Covid can be confusing. Is Impossible Foods’ round of fundraising really connected to the virus? The headlines will tell you it is. We’ve been focusing on how to help our clients partner with the media as they tell the pandemic story. That means mining for helpful data or insights. In some cases, we are tapping clients’ broader networks to offer reporters a deeper bench of validated sources. Staying silent is the right answer for some of them. Jordyn has been watching this unfold on social media as well.
Jordyn.
On Twitter, Facebook, and even Instagram, there is an even larger emphasis on a sentiment that has been brewing for a while: “Everyone’s an expert.” Anyone can share a stat or an article and feel like they are adding to the conversation. This can become a real problem, because some of the misinformation being shared—like the theory that the virus came from 5G towers—can incite harmful decisionmaking or send people into an unnecessary spiral.
S.
On the other hand, one of the things I’ve been encouraged by is how interested people are in science all of a sudden. I am not a scientist, but over the past few years I’ve become more engrossed in biology. Learning just a little more about it has changed the way I think; I hope that science will hold people’s interest after all of this. Christina, what do you think are going to be the long term effects on industry?
C.
I do wonder and fear how the vivid memory of a pandemic is going to shift the discourse around the advancement of biotech. But I hope the lessons we learn from this will help maintain the investments we need in research to track and respond to pathogens so that this never happens again. I also hope this situation will help us recognize how we all benefit from helping each other, and how absolutely necessary obtaining healthcare, a safety net, and equality is. What do you guys hope will last?
S.
The collaboration we are seeing in the scientific community right now is so encouraging. Scientists are working together across labs and companies to develop a solution faster. I’m hopeful about the treatments and innovations we could see form a broader shift toward unlocking information and placing more value on collective advancement.
J.
I am hopeful that people can take the idea of slowing down in our daily lives to heart. People are going back to the basics, making a point to connect with family and friends, and noticing more of the “little things” in the world. I hope this changes daily life in small and lasting ways.
Christina Agapakis is Creative Director of Ginkgo Bioworks, a biological design company based in Boston. During her PhD at Harvard, she worked on producing hydrogen fuel in bacteria and making photosynthetic animals.
Jordyn Lee is a Director at Mission North where she supports the agency’s Life Sciences practice and helps clients make complex concepts understandable and exciting to wide-ranging audiences.
Sarah Spitz is a Vice President at Mission North where she leads the company’s Life Sciences practice. Sarah loves using words and data to tell stories that matter and creatively solve communications challenges.
Cite This Essay
Agapakis, Christina, et al. “Science Storytelling.” Biodesigned: Issue 1, 6 May, 2020. Accessed [month, day, year].