In parties and in casual conversations, I have been asked about what I do for living.
I usually keep my explanation short. We are not in the academic setting explaining all the big ideas for a long time.
After the "what I do" conversation, what they understand is probably something like "He does medical research at a University and it's something about colon cancer".
It's not far off. Actually, it's a pretty good understanding.
We published a paper on February 2012, and our PR office made an introduction article out of it. They released the article on 5/14/2012 Monday. Here is the link.
http://www.ouhsc.edu/news/templates/?a=658&z=36
Press release/public relations are a quite different business from what we do. All the details (that we care about and to which we pour our professional expertise) are gone. Basic bare bone communication. The questions are; what we did, why it was important, and what is the practical/useful application of the work.
Actually, when we make a plan for future research (or writing a grant), we need to do this; thinking about the press release. Otherwise, it is easy to get lost in details. Like painters stepping away to see the big picture, we do need to state the big question.
Both the big picture and the details are important. But only the big picture for press release.
In a course of scientific writing/presentation training, we learn the concept of "funneling". Start from the big picture, and narrow down the question to investigate details, so that what we actually do (specific and detailed work) can be traced back to the big question. When a student skips this funneling, he is likely to lose a majority of his audience.
Sure. The press release article seems very simplified from our standpoint. But it is good for readers. And I am glad the PR office helped us out nicely for the article release.
Yesterday I was setting up my LinkedIn account. Profile is uploaded, but it needs more work. Let's see how it goes.
