Something I boldly remember asking myself as an undergraduate psychology student was, “why is research SO hard to understand?!” (I doubt I was alone.) For all of the money being poured into studies with the goal to truly help others, I also wondered why so few results seemed to make it to the mainstream. Certainly, there are some common barriers we all know of… the academic writing style (which is never how we would talk in everyday conversation), the writing outlets (well-respected academic journals, which unfortunately, can be difficult to access due to time and cost), and then understanding the analyses enough to even interpret them… these barriers failed to help move our research into others’ hands that we spent so much time and energy on.
I’ll admit, I’m no exception. Most of my writing has been for academic audiences. While I know there are researchers and teams and institutes working exceptionally hard to study translational research and help move research to practice (and inform research with practice), I came to realize I could do just a little bit more to help make my findings accessible to others. I want to help this process of translating my research into practice. As researchers, we work hard to dream up and carry out the studies, to analyze the data, and to write the findings (in my case, all alongside amazing colleagues!). Submitting the paper to a peer-reviewed journal, turning to the next project, and expecting anyone outside of academia to read or understand it seems silly. But honestly, after hearing this episode of the Good Life Project podcast interview with Simon Sinek, I realized I needed to help explain and translate my own research.
As Simon said:
“[Academics] have amazing concepts and I’m sure they could change the world, if only anybody understood them…”
(Thanks for the idea, Simon and Jonathan!)
So stay tuned… these little translational research updates will be a step to help take the research I’ve done and mold the articles into deliciously meaningful, applicable bite-sized pieces. The only thing I ask is for grace – learning to write for a non-academic audience is something I’ll need practice with, but as I’ve learned to write tight research papers for peer-reviewed journals, I hope to also learn to translate and communicate them in a way that’s interesting, meaningful, and accessible to all 🙂
Kindly,
