Developing Effective Messages for Improving Public Understanding of Engineering

开发有效的信息以提高公众对工程的理解本提案已提交给美国国家科学基金会工程理事会的工程教育和中心部门。该项目的目标是鼓励工程界就工程的作用、重要性和职业潜力与各种受众进行协调、一致和有效的沟通，包括学生、他们的父母、老师和辅导员；地方、州和联邦层面的政策制定者；以及广大公众。在美国，促进公众对工程学（PUE）理解的努力每年花费数亿美元。尽管有这些花费，工程对我们日常生活的影响，工程师工作的性质，以及通过工程教育提供的机会在很大程度上仍然没有被大多数美国人认识到。过去十年的民意调查和其他研究一致表明，成人和儿童对工程师的工作了解有限，认为工程是一个无聊或“书呆子”的职业，并认为工程不如其他职业（如医学、科学和教学）有声望。对工程的不了解可能会对吸引年轻的美国人——尤其是女性和少数族裔——从事与工程相关的职业产生潜在的严重影响，也会影响美国保持其技术创新能力的能力。正如2002年的报告《提高公众对工程的认识》（美国国家科学院出版社）所记载的那样，造成当前状况的一个重要原因是工程界未能使用一致的、经验得出的信息与它试图接触的各种受众进行沟通。本项目有以下目标：1。找出可能鼓励公众更好地理解工程学的少数信息，2。测试这些信息在不同受众中的有效性；向工程界传播消息测试的结果。为了达到目标，该计划将召集一组广告专业人士，帮助确定一套可能有效的PUE信息；与感兴趣的受众（如初高中学生、他们的父母、老师、指导顾问、商业和社区领袖）进行八次单独的焦点小组讨论，以完善信息；并通过对随机选择的一大群美国人进行调查，来确定这些精炼信息的相对有效性。由该主题相关领域的专家组成并由NAE校长任命的指导委员会将监督该项目。更广泛的影响该项目的主要产品将是指导委员会报告，该报告将描述研究的目的和方法，包括研究结果的摘要，并介绍委员会的研究结果和建议。该报告将分发给2002年NAE PUE调查项目中确定的约600个组织以及其他要求该报告的个人和团体。此外，指导委员会成员将在选定的专业会议上介绍该报告。通过确定一组经过经验测试的PUE消息，该项目将提供一个共同的基础，在此基础上，工程社区可以构建有效的通信策略，最终导致公众对工程的理解在这项提案中，工程界包括专业工程学会、工业和工业协会、设计和承包公司、许多学院和大学、教育协会、国家研发实验室、一些联邦机构、某些媒体部门和许多博物馆。

Developing Effective Messages for ImprovingPublic Understanding of EngineeringThis proposal is being submitted to the Division of Engineering Education & Centers within the NSF Directorate for Engineering. The goal of the project, to be carried out by the National Academy of Engineering, is to encourage coordinated, consistent, and effective communication by the engineering community about the role, importance, and career potential of engineering to a variety of audiences, including school children, their parents, teachers, and counselors; policy makers at the local, state, and federal level; and the public at large.Intellectual MeritEfforts to promote greater public understanding of engineering (PUE) in the United States consume hundreds of millions of dollars annually. Despite these expenditures, the impact of engineering on our daily lives, the nature of what engineers do, and the opportunities made available through an engineering education remain largely unrecognized by most Americans. Polling and other research over the past decade has consistently shown that adults and children have a limited understanding of what engineers do, perceive engineering to be a boring or "nerdy" profession, and view engineering as having less prestige than other professions, such as medicine, science, and teaching. Poor understanding of engineering has potentially serious consequences related to attracting young Americans-particularly women and under-represented minorities-into engineering-related careers and supporting the nation's ability to maintain its capacity for technological innovation. As documented in the 2002 report, Raising Public Awareness of Engineering (National Academies Press), one important cause of the current situation is the failure of the engineering community to use consistent and empirically derived messages for communicating with the variety of audiences it attempts to reach.This project has the following objectives:1. Identify a small number of messages that appear likely to encourage greater public understanding of engineering,2. Test the effectiveness of these messages in different audiences, and3. Disseminate the results of the message testing to the engineering community.In meeting the objectives, the project will convene a group of advertising professionals to help identify a set of potentially effective PUE messages; conduct eight separate focus group discussions with audiences of interest (such as middle and high school students, their parents, teachers, and guidance counselors; and business and community leaders) to refine the messages; and determine the relative effectiveness of the refined messages by conducting a survey of a large group of randomly selected Americans. A steering committee comprised of experts in fields relevant to the topic and appointed by the NAE President will oversee the project.Broader ImpactsThe primary product of the project will be a steering committee report, which will describe the purpose and method of the study, include a summary of the research findings, and present the committee's findings and recommendations. The report will be distributed to some 600 organizations identified in a 2002 NAE PUE survey project as well as to other individuals and groups that request it. In addition, members of the steering committee will present the report at selected professional meetings. By identifying a set of empirically tested PUE messages, the project will provide a common foundation upon which the engineering community can build effective communications strategies, ultimately leading to gains in public understanding of engineering.1 In this proposal, the engineering community includes professional engineering societies, industry and industry associations, design and contracting firms, many colleges and universities, education associations, national R&D laboratories, a number of federal agencies, certain media sectors, and many museums.