March Mammal Madness and the power of narrative in science outreach
Year: 2021
Type: article
Abstract: March Mammal Madness is a science outreach project that, over the course of several weeks in March, reaches hundreds of thousands of people in the United States every year. We combine four approaches to science outreach - gamification, social media platforms, community event(s), and creative products - to run a simulated tournament in which 64 animals compete to become the tournament champion. While the encounters between the animals are hypothetical, the outcomes rely on empirical evidence from the scientific literature. Players select their favored combatants beforehand, and during the tournament scientists translate the academic literature into gripping "play-by-play" narration on social media. To date ~1100 scholarly works, covering almost 400 taxa, have been transformed into science stories. March Mammal Madness is most typically used by high-school educators teaching life sciences, and we estimate that our materials reached ~1% of high-school students in the United States in 2019. Here we document the intentional design, public engagement, and magnitude of reach of the project. We further explain how human psychological and cognitive adaptations for shared experiences, social learning, narrative, and imagery contribute to the widespread use of March Mammal Madness.
Source: eLife
DOI: 10.7554/elife.65066
Authors: Katie Hinde, Carlos Eduardo G Amorim, Alyson F Brokaw, Nicole Burt, Mary C Casillas, Albert Chen, Tara Chestnut, Patrice K Connors, Mauna Dasari, Connor Fox Ditelberg, Jeanne Dietrick, Josh Drew, Lara Durgavich, Brian Easterling, Charon Henning, Anne Hilborn, Elinor K Karlsson, Marc Kissel, Jennifer Kobylecky, Jason Krell, Danielle N Lee, Kate M Lesciotto, Kristi L Lewton, Jessica E Light, Jessica Martin, Asia Murphy, William Nickley, Alejandra Núñez-de la Mora, Olivia Pellicer, Valeria Pellicer, Anali Maughan Perry, Stephanie G Schuttler, Anne C Stone, Brian Tanis, Jesse Weber, Melissa Wilson, Emma Willcocks, Christopher N Anderson
Institutions: Harvard University, Arizona State University, California State University, Northridge, University of Lausanne, Texas A&M University, Cleveland Museum of Natural History, University of Cambridge, University of Bath, National Park Service, Oregon State University, Colorado Mesa University, University of Notre Dame, Emerson College, American Museum of Natural History, SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry, Columbia University, Boston University, Tufts University, University of California, Riverside, Broad Institute, University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School, Appalachian State University, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, Pennsylvania State University, Sam Houston State University, University of Southern California, Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, The Ohio State University, Universidad Veracruzana, North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, Oregon State University Cascades, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Brown University, Dominican University
Language: English
Subfield: Library and Information Sciences
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: gold
Estimated APC paid: $2,500
OpenAlex ID: W3133078488