Gamification has gained increasing traction as an innovative approach to science communication. In this work, we present and evaluate Finding Gaia, a virtual treasure hunt designed during the COVID-19 pandemic to engage secondary school students in climate change education. The activity transforms a conventional lesson on climate risks and mitigation into a series of cooperative online challenges. It incorporates puzzles, narrative elements, and progression mechanics to foster scientific literacy on topics such as the greenhouse effect, adaptation strategies, and the energy transition. The game was delivered entirely online and evaluated using pre- and post-surveys administered to 206 students aged 15–18, complemented by qualitative facilitator insights. Results showed statistically significant gains in students' self-reported knowledge and interest in environmental and geophysical sciences. This study details the game design, learning objectives, and evaluation methodology, contributing a context-specific case study to current efforts in gamified science communication. The findings are shaped by the exceptional constraints of the pandemic period, which required a fully remote implementation, an aspect that makes this experience analytically valuable but not directly replicable.
Field-based education is a cornerstone of geoscience learning, offering students the opportunity to connect theoretical knowledge with real-world geological contexts. Yet access to such experiences remains limited due to logistical, financial, environmental, and social barriers, especially in remote or extreme environments like the High Arctic. These barriers may be especially salient for people with disabilities. In response to these challenges, Virtual Field Experiences (VFEs) are emerging as promising tools to complement traditional fieldwork. In this study we investigate how VFEs contribute to experiential learning among students at the University Centre in Svalbard (UNIS) in Longyearbyen, Svalbard. Using a mixed-methods approach grounded in experiential learning theory and the Technology Acceptance Model, we surveyed 66 students who used VFEs as part of geoscience courses at UNIS before and after physical field excursions. Results reveal that students found VFEs particularly valuable for pre-field orientation, spatial awareness, and post-field reflection. Students reported improved readiness, deeper conceptual understanding, and enhanced engagement. The virtual representations enabled them to revisit complex sites, identify overlooked features, and consolidate observations made during fieldwork. Importantly, most participants did not see VFEs as a replacement for traditional fieldwork but recognized their role in making field learning more inclusive, repeatable, and accessible. We highlight how VFEs may help students manage perceived novelty by familiarizing them with unfamiliar environments before initial field exposure. Students expressed strong interest in broader applications of VFEs across courses and disciplines, particularly when enriched with interactivity and guided tasks. These findings suggest that digital field representations hold significant promise for expanding access to geoscience education and perceived reinforcement of understanding. Future research should explore co-design practices with students and educators to optimize VFEs for equity, sustainability, and pedagogical impact across diverse learning environments.
Building an academic career requires a high level of dedication to research, frequent publishing, and maintaining visibility within the academic community. Scientific conferences are the central platforms for networking and knowledge exchange, making them keystones of an academic career. However, the early stages of an academic career often coincide with family planning considerations. Many young researchers face the challenge of balancing professional responsibilities with family obligations. A balancing act that becomes particularly difficult during non-routine work events such as conferences. Such occasions tend to pose significant organizational challenges for families. As mothers still provide most of the care, they are disproportionately affected. This conflict is an important factor contributing to the “leaky pipeline” by inhibiting the progression of women through academic ranks. Increasing the family-friendliness of conferences has the potential to diversify the scientific community, allowing more parents to participate, while reducing the tension between academic work and family obligations. Here, we present the results of an online survey among researchers in the geoscientific field, primarily based in Europe. The required support of parents at scientific conferences is analyzed and the acceptance for the implementation of new support offered by researchers without children is examined. Our key findings are that (1) parents wish for more support at conferences, (2) the majority of non-parents welcome family-friendly measures, and (3) conference organizers can accomplish a lot in this respect, even with small adjustments. The responses we received from parents paint a qualitative picture of measures that can be considered to create a family-friendly conference experience, ranging from increased transparency and awareness for the challenges of parents to tangible offers such as childcare and financial support. Our findings are distilled into guidelines for conference organizers, allowing them to better address the work-family conflict and transform their conferences towards more equity, diversity, and inclusion.
The impacts of anthropogenic climate change are becoming increasingly severe and the need for more informed policies based on robust and reliable scientific evidence is more critical than ever. Whilst contemporary climate evidence is routinely based on instrumental data, palaeoclimate offers a much longer temporal perspective of the behaviour of the climate system, climate extremes, and environmental responses. Offering in turn a longer-term perspective on how past climate has imposed both costs and opportunities for innovation on human communities and ecosystems. Climate policies increasingly frame societal responses in terms of adaptation, resilience, and risk management across multiple timescales. Despite the benefits of palaeoclimate insights, there is limited awareness of how palaeoclimate is being used, what barriers are currently limiting the inclusion of palaeoclimate evidence into decision making, and what opportunities are available for palaeoclimate evidence beyond the research community.In this study we set out to fill this knowledge gap and explore these barriers and facilitators for palaeoclimate integration in decision making. We do this by employing a semi-structured interview approach with policy advisors from UK Civil Service departments and with palaeoclimate scientists to determine their perception of palaeoclimate evidence as a source for policy evidence. The results showed a good agreement between the interviewed policy advisors and palaeoclimate scientists that there is a place for palaeoclimate evidence in decision making, especially with the contextualisation of current and future climate change. However, the results demonstrated that communication was the principal barrier - both the communication format of palaeoclimate dissemination and the communication of the relevance of palaeoclimate for decision making. We finish this article with a set of actionable recommendations written for palaeoclimate scientists that wish to maximise the potential of their research being used in a policy setting. These recommendations include writing policy briefs, conducting transdisciplinary collaboration, taking part in policy training, and finally using a co-production approach. We hope that by emphasising these recommendations, more palaeoclimate research will be used within decision making and in turn will enable more climate policies based on a longer-term perspective of climate variability.
Citizen science is increasingly recognized as essential for engaging the public in participatory sustainability research and for addressing the complex challenges of the Anthropocene. However, fostering meaningful dialogue between science and society remains difficult, often hindered by limited opportunities for interaction and varying levels of scientific understanding.Identifying outreach formats that foster citizen engagement and initiate productive exchanges between scientists and the public is therefore a key challenge.Here, we present a hands-on science outreach workshop designed to promote participation in science and foster dialogue between citizen and researchers. The workshop demonstrates the use of tree bark as a biomonitor of urban air quality through magnetic methods. It was conducted in schools and science fairs between 2018 and 2023, reaching 850 participants across nine scientific outreach events and 195 children in three elementary schools. The workshop, originally developed to engage with residents and introduce our approach and underlying concepts prior to participation in the NanoEnvi participatory research project, prompted more than 150 people to participate in the NanoEnvi community-based participatory research project, which offered to host passive biosensors to monitor air quality in their homes or at school in the Toulouse city (France). The workshop included three hands-on demonstrations and experiences. It invited participants to (i) discover the magnetic phenomena, (ii) extract airborne magnetic particles from soils, and (iii) measure air pollution trapped on bark like a scientist. The workshop was also accompanied by lectures and an exhibition.We observed that the workshop fostered two-way dialogue between researchers and a wide range of participants, creating opportunities for shared experimentation and knowledge co-production. We also found that the positive emotions raised by hands-on exploration of magnetic phenomena during the workshop led to engagement in a participatory project on potential air pollution in urban surroundings. These results led us to identify four key lessons: protocol evolution, science-society dialogue, inter-science communication, and eco-anxiety mitigation, highlighting the potential of hands-on geoscience outreach activities to strengthen science-society interactions.
Climate models are not just physics translated into computer code. They are powerful actors influencing and influenced by humans. Thus modelers need to learn and modelling courses need to teach not only the techniques of numerical discretisation and the physical understanding of the climate system, but also the underlying motivations, the uncertainties and the societal embededness of the modelling approach. Following a design-based research approach, this study develops a 50 h long course at Bachelor level that aims to teach students such interdisciplinary perspectives. With a reflective open-ended exercise, we elicit students' learning process through challenging climate modelling topics. We find that the students learn to appreciate the complexity of climate models and the intricacies of scientific practice itself, highlighting for example the role of values in science. The exercise reveals few misconceptions and no major hurdles in the students' learning that may have been expected from the interdisciplinary nature of the material. We thus conclude that the course is a practice-proven approach to teaching the physical basis of climate modelling as well as its critical reflection. Together with the openly shared material, it supplies an inspiration and practical template for lecturers to include more interdisciplinary content and reflection into their modelling courses.
The Increasing Earthquake Awareness in Switzerland project set out to connect students, teachers, and the wider public with earthquake science by reviving and extending the nationwide seismo@school initiative. Supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) AGORA programme, the project developed a suite of multilingual teaching resources, deployed near real-time seismic sensors in schools, and created hands-on activities such as the Lambda Slinky Seismometer kit to engage 12- to 18-year-olds. Although Switzerland is exposed to only moderate seismic hazard, earthquakes remain the natural hazard with the highest damage potential. Because most residents have never experienced a damaging earthquake, educational programmes play a crucial role in raising awareness and strengthening preparedness. Moreover, seismo@school initiatives can inspire younger generations to pursue geosciences by helping them appreciate the relevance of the field. This article presents the rationale, implementation, and impact of the project, and may serve as a guide for other countries seeking to develop similar initiatives. It examines how experiential, data-driven educational approaches can improve earthquake awareness and preparedness in moderate-hazard regions, how school-based seismometers benefit both teaching and scientific monitoring while considering the practical challenges of installation and operation, and what institutional and policy conditions are required to sustain such efforts over the long term.
Multi-hazard events pose increasingly complex challenges as natural hazards interact in cascading and compounding ways that amplify risks beyond individual hazards. Understanding these interactions - from hazard processes to cascading effects across social, economic, governance, and infrastructure systems - is critical for effective disaster risk management. National and international frameworks increasingly recognise these risk dynamics, most notably the United Nations Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030. The Sendai Framework Mid-Term Review (MTR) in 2023, however, identified substantial implementation challenges across its four priorities; these challenges include gaps in risk data governance, fragmented multi-scale coordination, insufficient investment mechanisms, and limited coverage of multi-hazard early warning systems. With the Sendai Framework approaching its conclusion, there is a pressing need to address these current shortcomings. Responding to this need, the 3rd International Conference on Natural Hazards and Risks in a Changing World took place in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, on 12-13 June 2024, with the objective of: (1) assessing current progress in multi-hazard risk research and policy practice; and (2) identifying scientific priorities to support further implementation of Sendai Framework until 2030 and beyond. Here, we document the arc of the scientific discussions held at the conference, synthesise the main findings from sessions, and set forth expert knowledge on how state-of-the-art science can fill gaps outlined by the MTR by identifying four perspective themes: (1) assessments and tools for risk understanding and decision-making; (2) understanding and management of complex risk landscapes; (3) emerging technologies for risk and resilience; and (4) multi-level governance for coordinated risk management. Ultimately, we call for governance reform enabling multi-scale coordination, investment in knowledge brokers translating across systems and scales, and participatory technology deployment ensuring emerging tools are applied to reduce disaster risk management inequalities. This perspective emphasises that effective Disaster Risk Reduction requires both incremental technical improvements and fundamental shifts in governance, data sharing, and inclusive engagement to address systemic risks and implementation gaps.
One of the most important challenges Europe faces to date is the need for a drastic increase in the extraction, production, and recycling of critical raw materials to meet the demands of renewable energy technologies, as specified in the European Union's climate targets. However, this topic is not widely discussed amongst publics and is underrepresented within the field of informal education and public engagement. This pilot study describes the development of a public engagement toolkit called “GreenDealz” that aims to address this gap. We focus specifically on the festival environment as an informal education setting. GreenDealz was created via an iterative process informed by in-situ data collection across six cultural/arts and science festivals in Ireland. GreenDealz engages informal audiences through a supermarket experience, where participants must choose key critical raw materials to build essential renewable energy technologies and achieve EU climate goals. Evaluation is integrated into the tactile experience of GreenDealz. Embedded assessment measures yield quantitative data that show GreenDealz may significantly enhance audience knowledge of the topic.
Misinformation about climate change leads to societal damage in a number of ways and consequently, resources are required to support interventions that counter their influence. Aiming to meet this need, Skeptical Science is a highly-visited website featuring 250 rebuttals of misinformation about climate change. The rebuttals are written at three levels - basic, intermediate, and advanced - in order to reach as wide an audience as possible. This study collected survey data from visitors to the website and assessed the effectiveness of rebuttals in reducing acceptance of climate myths and increasing acceptance of climate facts. Our data found that nearly half of the visitors were already highly convinced regarding climate facts. We found that the rebuttals were effective in reducing belief in climate myths, but that some rebuttals show a concerning reduction in belief in climate facts. The greatest improvement occurred with visitors who began with the most inaccurate climate perceptions. This indicates that the website is useful for two main audiences - those who are convinced about climate change but looking for material to support their own climate communication efforts, and those who disagree with climate facts but are open to new information. We examine potential ways that Skeptical Science rebuttals could be updated to improve their performance in raising climate literacy and critical thinking skills.
In virtual field courses, it is challenging to design a truly explorative course element. In relation to theories of student learning, more inquiry and student-centred virtual fieldwork have been proposed to facilitate student exploration and engagement. Here, we outline the development of an inquiry virtual fieldwork activity using 360 degrees videos, along with additional classroom tools that allow students to collect data, develop hypotheses independently, and combine them with known science to draw geologically viable conclusions.
Abstract. Fractional crystallization and mineralogy are foundational yet challenging topics in undergraduate geoscience education. The M&M’s® magma chamber lab is a widely used hands-on activity to illustrate these concepts, but students often focus on procedural tasks over conceptual understanding. To address this, Magma Pop, a serious educational game, was developed for a third-year volcanology course at the University of Canterbury, New Zealand. The game reinforces key concepts such as mineral formulae, the role of fractional crystallization, and the relationship between temperature and magma composition through interactive, visual gameplay. In this paper, we document the iterative development of Magma Pop and aim to emphasize the role of games in advancing geoscience pedagogy and highlight how Magma Pop can be used in a geoscience curriculum.
ClimarisQ is both a web and mobile game developed by the Institut Pierre-Simon Laplace to support climate change communication through interactive decision-making. This paper presents an exploratory evaluation of the game based on a post-play questionnaire completed by 77 users. Respondents rated ClimarisQ positively in terms of usability and scientific credibility. Self-reported outcomes indicate that the game supported reflection on the complexity, trade-offs, and uncertainty of climate-related decision-making, rather than the acquisition of factual knowledge, particularly among users with prior expertise. The respondent group was predominantly composed of educated and climate-aware adults, which limits generalization to other audiences. Beyond the questionnaire, the game has been tested in dozens of facilitated sessions with thousands of non-specialist participants, with consistently positive feedback. These results suggest that ClimarisQ can function as a complementary tool for climate education and outreach, especially when used in facilitated settings that encourage discussion and interpretation.
Nepal is located in one of the most seismically active regions of the globe, where a major earthquake is long overdue, yet much of the existing building stock remains highly vulnerable to collapse during intense ground shaking. Public engagement in earthquake preparedness is a vital aspect of reducing casualties and limiting structural damage, with education playing a significant role in shaping both individual and collective protective behaviours. In honour of the 10th anniversary of the devastating, the 2015 Mw 7.9 Gorkha earthquake, an Earthquake Learning Exhibition was organized in Pokhara, Nepal, to improve students' knowledge of earthquakes, risk perception, and preparedness. The event showcased fourteen interactive modules that explored earthquake science, causes, and safety measures, engaging nearly 2000 participants mostly at age 11 to 17. Pre and post-event surveys indicated notable advancements in scientific understanding, with 93 % of students identifying plate tectonics as the primary cause of earthquakes, and 95 % recognizing their vulnerability to events exceeding a magnitude of 8. Students exhibited increased awareness of structural vulnerabilities, local seismic risks, and the likelihood of experiencing a major earthquake in their lifetime. A significant 85 % of those surveyed rated the exhibition positively, with 98 % reporting enhanced preparedness, and many indicated plans to share knowledge within their communities, suggesting a ripple effect in disaster preparedness. The exhibition has proven to be an effective and replicable model for integrating interactive learning with community-based preparedness. Recommendations include long-term follow-up and the expansion of teacher training to ensure the sustainability and amplification of its impact.
This paper presents the results of a project based on a method that integrates geological knowledge and local cultural heritage within the Alagna Valsesia area, located in the Sesia Val Grande Geopark, Italy. Through a multidisciplinary, co-creative approach an artist's book was realised serving both as a guide to the geotrail and a communicative tool for broader educational outreach. Thanks to the engagement of members of the local Walser community and the cooperation of artists from Dolomiticontemporanee collective, the project blended geoscientific communication with locally rooted storytelling to enhance understanding of the geological and cultural landscapes of the area. The artist's book combines scientific accuracy with vernacular insights gathered during the co-creation process, covering significant observation points that narrate geological phenomena and the legacy of the Walser people. The new artist's book represents an innovative way to communicate geoscience providing a valuable tool for visitors, educational institutions, and the local community, promoting conservation awareness through an immersive, narrative-driven experience. The method presented in this study is applicable in other settings and is particularly suitable for geopark areas, as it offers a new way of communicating geological heritage by integrating the work of geoscientists, artists and local communities. Moreover, this new strategy avoids the logistical obstacles associated with physical educational displays in mountainous terrains and underlines the benefits of accessible, multi-platform geoscientific engagement.
Many climate scientists refrain from advocacy and activism because they worry it decreases their credibility. Through a survey of almost 1000 Dutch respondents, we compare responses to a text written in a neutral tone to those of a text written in an advocating tone on perceived credibility of the authoring scientist in these texts. Analyses show that the perceived credibility of the scientist who authored the text increases by advocacy overall, and that the advocating scientist is considered more credible than the neutral scientist specifically in their perceived sensitivity and care for society. We also analyse the effect of the type of visual element in the text, to test whether a visual element that is more science-based can increase the perceived credibility of the scientist in the knowledge domain. However, we do not find any significant differences between a scientific bar chart and a stock photo. Based on these results, we conclude that advocacy can increase the climate scientist's average perceived credibility. However, we find that the fraction of respondents that feels called to action is not higher for those who read the advocacy text, suggesting that advocacy does not stimulate behavioural change in this case.
With the impacts of climate-related hazards, such as extreme heat, heavy precipitation, drought, flooding, wildfires, tropical storms, and severe weather becoming more intense and frequent, exposure to these hazards continues to increase as population growth expands into areas prone to higher hazard risk such as coasts, wetlands, and wildlands. Despite these trends, adaptation efforts remain a patchwork of local initiatives implemented primarily at the individual and household level and are not enough to keep pace with increasing hazard impacts. Most climate communication strategies have targeted non-expert audiences to raise awareness and increase adaptive behaviours. However, studies exploring how climate scientists are engaging professionally and personally with climate change impacts are rare. A key aspect of this study is that it specifically focuses on geoscientists, a cohort of experts who study and understand the causes, impacts, and risks of natural hazards. Their professional work provides a distinct perspective on the tangible consequences of climate change. This study is part of a larger research project which examined discipline-level engagement (i.e., funding, research, publications) and professional engagement (i.e., teaching, learning, work) across the geosciences in the United States. We review these larger trends in discipline-level and professional engagement with natural hazards and focus the bulk of this paper on an extended line of inquiry that assesses the integration of expert hazards knowledge into geoscientists' personal decision-making processes. The results of this study indicated a knowledge-action gap related to hazard engagement that appears to be systemic across the geoscience discipline within the United States. This study provides a baseline for future research into evaluation of climate expert behaviours and actions as it relates to climate hazards. It also provides a new communication simulation that can be tested internationally and compared to this study's results. In addition, the simulation can be incorporated into in-person settings to facilitate discussion about climate hazard risk considerations.
Like computed tomography (CT) scans used in medicine to look inside human bodies, marine seismologists conduct controlled-source experiments to understand the characteristics of the oceanic lithosphere (rigid outer Earth's layer) that covers > 70 % of the surface of our planet. While at sea aboard a research vessel, using the air compressed in an array of stainless-steel cylinders, we produce small earthquakes in the form of air bubbles that propagate through the water, Earth's crust, and mantle and return to be recorded by the instruments we place in the water column or on the seafloor. Although the technique was developed in the 1950s and has been extensively used by academia and industry for decades, it has remained obscured, primarily because it is conducted offshore, out of sight. To expose the less-known technique and to showcase associated career paths, we designed a hands-on model that encourages interaction. Together with the model, we present fundamental Earth processes and the methods we use to explore them, followed by video materials we recorded at sea while collecting the data. Furthermore, to quantitatively evaluate our effort, we constructed age-adapted control quizzes completed by the participants before and after the workshop. These quizzes were designed to assess the student's understanding of the concepts, providing a clear measure of the workshop's effectiveness. We have conducted the workshop package at several outreach events. Without any exception, the results of the quizzes show that students of ages 9-18 years improved their overall knowledge covered by the experiment. This result is a signal that supports the effectiveness of "learning by doing" science in a playful, interactive way.
Sense of belonging plays a significant role in students' academic success. For the "Environmental Changes at Higher Latitudes" master's programme, success is effectively communicating geoscience research and ideas to the students. This study explores students' perceived sense of belonging, the conditions for belonging among master's students of this particular programme, and the impact of belonging on educational effectiveness in a climate change context. This programme is organised jointly between universities of three Nordic nations and for it - and for the multilocality of the geoscience themes - has a particularly high degree of mobility. Therefore, the programme lacks elements present in a typical higher education experience, such as on-site attendance in a physically shared space with a relatively stable group of peers and instructors which are thought significant for the students' feelings of belongingness. Based on 15 interviews, we elaborate on the findings of the students' motivation, ability and opportunities to belong and on the construct of their perceived belonging. Emerging from this study, these constructs for sense of belonging consist of the students' sense of familiarity - familiar elements in the place, surroundings and culture; sense of recognition - recognised by oneself and others as a peer and a member of the knowledge community; and last, sense of relevance - finding their studies relevant and interesting. Due to the unique set-up of the programme, the study reveals insight into elements that support the sense of belonging, crucial especially in such geoscience and climate education and communication that might lack the typical shared physical space of a programme, but applicable to curriculum design and development of any programme with high degree of mobility.
A web app called “Sedimentary Rock!” (https://geo.ris.ac.jp/kitazawa/SedimentaryRock/, Kitazawa et al., 2017) has been developed to reveal geological strata to human hearing and rhythmic senses, much like music, in a straightforward manner. The web app was designed and opened for non-specialists in geology. A columnar section created on the app is converted to notes and played. The thickness of a layer is converted to the length of a note, and the grain size is converted to pitch level. We converted schematic columnar sections of several environments and real Pleistocene strata from Vietnam into music and surveyed the educational effect of the web app using a questionnaire. Sedimentary Rock! makes learners understand that the strata consist of concepts of grain size and thickness of stratum, and provides a new intuitive experience to listen to geological history.
