Conference demographics and footprint changed by virtual platforms
Conference demographics and footprint changed by virtual platforms
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DOI：
10.1038/s41893-021-00823-2
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发表时间：
2021-12-09
影响因子：
27.6
通讯作者：
Kumar, Manish
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Skiles, Matthew;Yang, Euijin;Kumar, Manish
会议传播研究，发展专业网络并培训员工。不幸的是，它们还为气候变化做出了贡献，并为实现社会可持续的工作环境提供了障碍。在这里，我们分析了将面对面会议转变为虚拟会议对改善科学和工程会议中多样性，公平和包容性的最新影响。评估了成本，性别，职业阶段和地理位置在内的因素。虚拟会议表明，几乎所有指标都可以明显地辨别，并且在某些情况下会改善数量级。根据参与者的调查结果，这种改进可能归因于减少的财务和个人生活负担的结合。然而，尽管有这种明显的影响，但对于实现这种新格式的广泛采用和接受是必要的虚拟网络功能和海报会议的进一步发展。个人会议通常会导致较大的碳足迹，同时限制可以参加的人的包容性。该分析使用大流行来衡量类似于虚拟会议的类似环境和人口结果。
Conferences disseminate research, grow professional networks and train employees. Unfortunately, they also contribute to climate change and present barriers to achieving a socially sustainable work environment. Here, we analyse the recent impact of transforming in-person conferences into virtual conferences on improving diversity, equity and inclusion in science and engineering conferences. Factors including cost, gender, career stage and geographic location were evaluated. Virtual conferences demonstrated a clearly discernable and, in some cases, orders of magnitude improvement across nearly all metrics. On the basis of participant survey results, this improvement may be attributed to a combination of reduced financial and personal-life burdens. However, despite this clear impact, further development of virtual networking features and poster sessions is necessary to achieve widespread adoption and acceptance of this new format.In-person conferences have typically resulted in a large carbon footprint while limiting inclusivity of those who can attend. This analysis uses the pandemic to gauge like-for-like environmental and demographic outcomes for virtual conference attendance.