journalism

The Ibero-American Day of Science takes place on 28 November; it was launched last year during a meeting of science ministers within the framework of the Ibero-American Summit. On this occasion, we have compiled below several guides and databases maintained by universities, research centres and other science organisations that aim to help journalists in search of expert sources. Of course, this list is not comprehensive; if you have suggestions for other guides and sources—whether from Spain, Portugal or Latin America—that we could add, please don't hesitate to contact us so that we can continue to expand this resource.

Floods in Libya and Greece, fires in Australia or earthquakes in Morocco. Disasters are on the rise, partly because climate change is affecting the frequency and intensity of some of them. The media often use the term 'natural disaster' to describe them, something a team of crisis and disaster specialists is trying to change.

The survey Scientific Disinformation in Spain, carried out by FECYT in the framework of the European project IBERIFIER, shows that most citizens are concerned about the effects of scientific disinformation and that they do not feel very confident when it comes to differentiating between false and true content. The report includes a series of recommendations for dealing with this type of misinformation, which are reproduced below.

The publications in which scientific results are made public, known as papers in the jargon, are sometimes newsworthy, that is, what they report can be narrated to a wider - non-scientific - audience as journalistic news. But in the paper-news transition the message is formatted very differently.

Scientific studies are regularly published in various scientific journals. Science journalists who have contacted the journal and registered have prior access to them under an embargo that they undertake to respect. This is an advantageous system, but it is not without its critics.

Not all studies are revolutionary and not all researchers are free of conflicts of interest. This Decalogue of common mistakes aims to help you write about science with rigour and, above all, putting the public first.