One of a writer’s main objectives is to reach his or her desired audience to effectively convey their message. This means that authors constantly use the knowledge of their audience to their advantage and pre-determine their tone to adjust for what type of writing will best embody what their audience will internalize. This happens often in the scientific community, as research articles studies commonly contribute to widespread news articles, two types of writing that differ in immense fashion. Specifically, this is shaped through the destruction of the wildlife on earth, from natural occurrence and from negative human intervention. Basically, Logos and Pathos conflicting with each other describe the accommodation of the author well. However, occurring in all types of writing, notable differences are prominent and change based on multiple factors, including genre, audience, and author’s background.
Genre is a widely discussed topic throughout literary conversation, that often is described as a universal characteristic which categorizes certain writings based on their content. Genre can apply to all things, based on our psychological schema. How information is categorized, everything is placed into separate groups to help comprehend information based on scenario, context, and what is already known about the writing or information. This universal nature of the topic causes the change in subject based on the same categories that determine message projection. For instance, a history textbook will not be similar to a fantasy novel. This does not
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mean that the two pieces have to be about different subjects. For example, a news article about snowfall in arctic regions and how it is affecting wildlife would differ in genre than the published scientific study that the news source obtained information about the snowfall from. It is highly important to understand this concept because it is formed at the root of the accommodation difference in how the author reaches his or her audience through the discourse. A complete example of this is shown regarding snowfall and wildlife destruction as mentioned before. An article published on the Mongabay news site, “Extreme snowfall led to reproductive collapse in some Arctic wildlife in 2018”, uses a scientific study from the PLOS Biology Journal titled, “An ecosystem-wide Reproductive Failure with More Snow in the Arctic”, to show scientific data in its reasoning. Although both writings discuss the same topics, they are different in genre and as a result have different styles of writing included. Both authors know their specific audience and therefore change their style based on the genre of the text. The disparity in each writing’s genre can be found by looking at the authors, who have different backgrounds, looking at the publication sources, Mongbay News and PLOS Academic Journal, and by observing the intended purpose of the writings. The intended purpose of the scientific article is to display factual evidence through the scientific method, which is shown through the emphasis of recognizing the impacts of climate change with research, as it states, “researchers have just witnessed another extreme summer…public interest has long been focused on global warming trends” (Schmidt et al). The intended purpose of the news article is to transform the scientific data into an appealing article that will enthrall the reader. This is stated during the articles use of quotes such as, “But extreme weather events triggered by human-caused climate change are wreaking havoc on Arctic wildlife” (Dasgupta). This shows the intended purpose because it
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presents a harsh sentence early in the article that sets the tone for the remainder of the writing, and helps the reader understand how the rest of the article will project the scientific data. The intended purpose shows the genre of the articles well because it helps define the separations between the two and can easily have a significant effect on the content of the articles, which directly influences type of genre.
Specific audience is also an important factor in determining the tone and style of writing that is attached to scientific research and news articles. Different audiences expect different things out of what they read, meaning that each categorized group of people will choose different writings based on what they can best understand. Essentially, people who are likely to read an academic study about snare trapping data in Southeast Asian regions are not likely to be the same people that want to read the emotional news article about the animals dying in the regions due to snare trapping. In this article, which was published by CNN and titled, “Barbaric Snares are Wiping Out Southeast Asia’s Wild Animals”, graphic images and phrases saturated with pathos are stated, such as “hunted out of existence”, and “left to rot” (Lazarus). These phrases with severe negative connotations show the obvious attempts of the author to reach the audience’s emotion by using pathos to convey information. This is significantly different from the scientific article published by the US national library of Medicine, titled, “Experimental estimation of snare detectability for robust threat monitoring”, from which the news articles information is derived. Similarly, the actual scientific study on this topic of snares is much more logically inclined, including phrases such as, “threat monitoring” (O’Kelly et al). Although they suggest roughly the same meaning, each is different in the severity they present to the reader’s mood. While the news article attacks the emotions of the reader, the scientific article is much more informative
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and professional about the topic. Mainly, the authors provide this distinction due to the intended audience because readers of academic studies typically are searching for scientific results and quantitative answers, rather than an emotional, qualitative story. Although highly different in tone and style, news articles such as this should not be discounted, as they may be effective in reaching the emotions of an environmental activist, just not necessarily the emotions and desires of a scientist looking for follow-up study methods. Additionally, in a separate article published by Forbes about the demographics of different news viewers, CNN was ranked as one of the news sources which had the lowest average age in their viewers, the article goes on to say that, “younger viewers are less set in their ways than older viewers and are more amenable to switching brands” (Berr). This could potentially explain then why CNN uses extreme phrases to capture the audience’s attention, therefore swaying the audience into relying on CNN’s news rather than taking their loyalty elsewhere. This contrasts with the audience of scientific articles, who are described in an article published by The Scientific American, which presents numerical data which suggests that most of the academically inclined reader audience in the scientific community had parents who completed at least one college degree during their education (Guterl). If this is the case, an inference can be made about the scientific audience that suggests the childhood the readers grew up in, with parents who had completed a high level of education, raised their children of the upcoming scientific audience to appreciate logically inclined presentation of scientific data, which would reflect the parents own time invested in education. Audience is crucial in the presentation of scientific data and how it can differ because it is one of the sole factors that can contribute to how the author or publishers choose to present the article based on what their audience will best internalize.
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Author’s background is also extremely important to the scientific accommodation and variance in presentation of science. Many authors have different past experiences, educations, careers, and childhood home environments that contribute to the overall change in the way they present science through writing. For instance, many columnists and journalists have different career goals than that of scientific researches. While journalists for major news sources usually write to attracted readers to scientific data, researchers who conduct studies generally are more concerned with factual evidence that supports their hypothesis, and relay that information literally and precisely. Examples from the specific articles include the contrast between the background in occupation of the authors from the writings. One of the authors of the academic study, “Am ecosystem wide reproductive failure with more snow in the Arctic”, Niels Martin Schmidt, is affiliated with many European and Baltic Universities, specifically the Artic Research Centre and the Department of Bioscience at Arhaus University. The author of the news article is named Shreya Dasgupta, who is a science writer for many large news corporations such as BBC Earth and The Guardian (Mongabay). These news sources tend to be different than academic institutions like Arhaus and research centers, but also have different objectives in how they reach their audience. Therefore, the author’s background is extremely important based on their certain occupation. Furthermore, the presentation of the science in different ways is affected by the social and environmental background of the authors, such as where they are from, or where they went to school. A writer from an area with generally different political views may have an effect on the outcome of the way they present science to attract an audience than one with opposite political roots. Author’s background can sway the way science is presented simply due to the fact that author’s internal beliefs will affect the way they write.
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Works Cited
O’Kelly, Hannah J., et al. “Experimental Estimation of Snare Detectability for Robust Threat Monitoring.” Ecology and Evolution, 2018.
Schmidt, Niels Martin., et al. „An ecosystem-wide reproductive failure with more snow in the Arctic.” PLOS Biology Journal, 2019.
Lazarus, Sarah. “Barbaric snares are wiping out Southeast Asia’s wild animals”, CNN, 2019.
“Articles by Shreya Dasgupta”, Mongabay News, 2019.
Dasgupta, Shreya. “Extreme Snowfall led to reproductive collapse in some Arctic wildlife in 2018.” Mongabay News, 2019.
Berr, Jonathan. “Has CNN Discovered ‘The Fountain of Youth’ In Cable News?” Forbes, 2018.
Guterl, Fred. “Diversity in Science: Where Are the Data?” Scientific American, 2014.
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