Wendy Barnaby reveals the results of the survey

The BA recently surveyed SPA readers, to find out what you think of the magazine and whether you’d like to see changes. Here are the results.

First of all, who are you?

One-third of you are female; two-thirds, male. You are spread throughout the age range, with twice as many of you working or studying than retired. Most of you find the magazine helps you in your work, and that it is politically balanced.

Most read a daily paper, but your real delight is scientific journals, which you consume more regularly than you read magazines like New Scientist. Relatively few of you read current affairs magazines.

Most of you know that the magazine is freely available on the BA’s website, but as a group you are adamant that you want to go on receiving a hard copy.

The subject that most interests you is science communication.

Content

Over the years, we’ve tried to tailor the sorts of pieces in the magazine to the busy readers we know you are. We’ve therefore shortened the pieces and included lots of debate, both because that produces lively contributions and because it mirrors the world we seek to report on. It’s hard to know whether we have the length of pieces right: some of you suggested longer articles.

When you ranked the content according to how much it interests you, there was little distance between what you found most and least interesting. However, you said that the features, the shorts and the focus pieces are most interesting, followed by the opinion pieces, SET in Parliament, SPATalk, review, the exchanges and correspondence.

Many of you would like to see more correspondence. So would I! But we can’t print letters we don’t get. If you’d like to read more comments from readers, please send them in yourself.

Several of you commented that the layout could be improved, and we’re looking into this.

SPATalk

I was intrigued that the SPATalk wasn’t more popular amongst readers. It could be simply that I have an inflated idea of its interest because it is, as the emails go backwards and forwards, an ever-present factor as each issue is taking shape. However, I would have thought that it gives a good summary of contentious issues. It may be that the participants find it more valuable than you do!

Opponents who may initially be doubtful about publicly locking horns often comment at the end that they’ve found it valuable. They seem to appreciate the format, which gives them time to consider their contributions (each person has three working days to write each piece), and keeps them in control. And at least once recently, after a series of pointed exchanges, one pair agreed to meet for an amiable drink to continue their discussion.

Of course, things are not always so friendly behind the scenes, and we occasionally have debaters who fire off angry emails alongside their pieces.

Perhaps we would find a different pecking order amongst other journalists, some of whom occasionally use a Spat as the basis for a piece in another medium. You may object that we don’t exist for journalists! However, the BA is all about encouraging debate and dialogue, and if SPA can stimulate that elsewhere, that’s all to the good.

Specifics

Some people would like to see more about the BA’s activities in the magazine, and this is something we will take on board. Others suggested more bullet-point summaries of features. We do this for two-page features but feel that, if we did it for those on a single page, we’d use up too much space for the summary. As it is, the titles and sub-headings provide a good guide to the content.

Most of you are happy with the magazine’s current name but, should we want to change it, you’ve given us plenty of suggestions.

Change of focus

You may have noticed that the last couple of issues have dropped pieces on science policy generally, and concentrated on public engagement. This will be our new focus. We are the only popular publication specialising in this area, and by doing this we will be concentrating on what you find most interesting, and reflecting the BA’s mission of fostering dialogue about science.

Some of you complained that the science content of the magazine is shallow. I hope that the reason for this will be clear: that’s not what we’re primarily about.

Thanks to everyone who took part. We do listen to your views, and appreciate the many encouraging comments you’ve made.

Wendy Barnaby is the Editor of SPA