Playing with Science: Using Interactive Games to Improve Public Engagement

Abstract:

The challenge of communicating science in an accurate, concise, and engaging way has never been more important. While much focus has been put on how scientific information gets delivered, perhaps less value has been put on what the public can communicate back to science. Imparting scientific knowledge to the public in one direction, however successfully done, could be called "transmission." It's not until the public responds that you have "communication," or maybe a better word would be "conversation."

The National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) has been working on a project for use in its educational visitor center that not only attempts to engage the public with concise, accurate scientific information, but also to help the public respond, in order to create a communicative circuit. Using an interactive game platform, visitors can immerse themselves in a voyage of scientific discovery by choosing a character and building a story line based on multiple selections, a version of a “build your own adventure” experience. We are exploring ways to capture data from these interactions in order to inform additional program development based on areas of greatest interest to the public. The game could thus be used to update existing exhibits so they better reflect those areas of interest, making them more relevant and engaging to visitors, and expanding opportunities for dialogue between science centers and members of the public.