Leggette’s Research Program
Leggette’s team focuses on EDUCATING THE VOICES OF SCIENCE. They seek to improve science through communication, establish effective two-way communication between the scientists and the public, and enhance the scientists’ ability to communicate with their constituents. We do this by developing curricula for scientists to learn how to communicate, analyzing audiences, and testing communication medium effectiveness. Projects are funded by a variety of local, regional and national partners.
Current Research Projects
FACT Big Data Analytics
Agriculture producers are faced with substantial challenges daily, and sifting through information and recommendations can be challenging. FACT: Big Data Analytics to Harmonize Disease and Pest Management with Agricultural Logistics was funded by USDA’s National Institute for Food and Agriculture Agriculture and Food Research Initiative Food and Agriculture Cyberinformatics and Tools grant program in 2020.
The landscape of agriculture is constantly changing and evolving. Today’s farmers and ranchers have endless access to information and tools, but many of these tools have not taken into consideration producer-operability and a comprehensive understanding of data analytics. The goal of this project is to enhance simultaneous management of multiple agricultural problems through the use of data analytics.
This project will benefit cotton producers by:
- Serving as a model for the creation and implementation for other decision support tools in the cotton industry,
- Providing researchers and others involved with producer education a better understanding of producers’ communication needs and how producers make decisions in their operations, and
- Improving relationships between research institutions and cotton producers through improved communication tactics
The Texas A&M University Department of Plant Pathology and Microbiology is leading the project.
This project is supported by AFRI Competitive Grant no. 2019-07543 from the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture.
National REEU-ECN: The FANH Scientists’ Network
The National REEU-ECN is a program is focused on supporting the REEU program by creating and maintaining the tools to support a community of practice for program directors and by making the REEU programs more accessible to potential student participants through a central digital hub.
Many land grant university members are aware of and/or participate in the REEU program; however, too many non-land-grant institutions (including junior colleges offering associate degrees or higher), private organizations or corporations, and other eligible applicants/entities are unaware of it. The National REEU-ECN project will provide centralized networking services to REEU programs and help participants develop communication skills (currently not required in REEUs) that they can use to increase non-participants’ awareness, engagement, and appreciation of REEU programs.
The project’s goal is to develop and sustain a national community of practice for REEU programs, which are meant to prepare undergraduate students to enter the agricultural workforce with both knowledge and skills to help them succeed. To learn more about the FANH Scientists’ Network, visit reeu.org.
This work is supported by Agricultural and Food Research Initiative grant no. 2023-67037-40319 from the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture.
HATCH: Bridging the Great Divide
Because “people communicate about science for diverse reasons” (National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, 2017, p. vii), understanding science communications efforts and outcomes as well as its impacts on behavior change is critical. Participatory research (Neef & Neubert, 2011), audience group analyses, and science communications learning goals (Baram-Tsabari & Lewenstein, 2017) are documented ways that scientists can engage the end-user in their science communications efforts. “Science communication occurs within a complex system whose elements include the content to be communicated, the format in which it is communicated, the diverse organizations and individuals who are also communicating science, the various audiences, the channels of communication, the political and societal realities within which the communication takes place, and the many other sources from which audiences may find additional and perhaps conflicting or inaccurate scientific information” (National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, 2017, p. 84).
The goal of the Bridging the Great Divide project is to develop a science communications training model for the food and agricultural sciences. The five target objectives are guided by the Koru integrated model of science communication (Longnecker, 2016), science communication learning goals model (Baram-Tsabari & Lewenstein, 2017), employability skills framework (Perkins Collaborative Resource Network, 2017), seven soft skill clusters (Crawford et al., 2011), and six dimensions of participatory research framework (Neef & Neubert, 2011).
Train scientists to communicate effectively based on their goals, context, and target.
Identify gaps in the science communications process that are decreasing the effectiveness of science communication and increasing the likelihood for delivery of misinformation;
Explain effective science communications that increases science engagement;
Explain how science communications efforts can be tailored to meet the needs and concerns of stakeholders that vary by demographics, psychographics, geographics, and agricultural production practices and interests;
Explain how stakeholders make decisions based on targeted science communications; and
SARE: Sheep Integration for Diverse and Resilient Organic Cotton Systems
Coming Soon
REEU: Science Influencers
The USDA-funded Science Influencers program prepares students with the skills to share scientifically grounded information across multiple media platforms, including social media networks, blogs, and vlogs.
The program includes research, education, and extension activities with primary and collaborating mentors; ongoing mentor meetings; science communications coursework; professional development workshops in social media use and research; leadership skill development; and immersive learning experiences, such as paid internships, and partial expenses for research or study abroad, or research conferences.
Students will gain relevant scientific knowledge and professional communications experience through the Science Influencers program.
Undergraduates who attend a university within the Texas A&M University System can APPLY to become a Science Influencer.
This work is supported by the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative’s Research and Extension Experiences for Undergraduates program area, grant no. 2021-68018-34633/project accession no. 1026051, from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, National Institute of Food and Agriculture
Texas Climate-Smart Initiative
Coming Soon
Partnership with Texas Water Resources Institute
The Science Communications Lab has an ongoing partnership with the Texas Water Resources Institute (TWRI). This partnership includes research designed to identify farmers’ barriers to and reasons for the adoption of water and soil regenerative practices. In addition, this effort includes the development and testing of strategic messages to encourage greater adoption and engagement with farmers, land managers, and ranchers.
The overarching goal of TWRI’s collaborative research with the Science Communications Lab is to help agricultural audiences, practitioners, and researchers understand how communication methods influence water conservation behaviors and strategies to protect Texas’s water resources and quality.
This collaboration is supported by the Texas Water Resources Institute.
Past Research Projects
Fueling the Mind, Feeding the World
High school graduates need more soft skills preparation to be successful in college majors and careers in food, agricultural, natural resources, and human sciences. Fueling the Mind, Feeding the World: Delivering Communication and Decision-Making Curricula to Secondary Agricultural Education Students was funded by USDA’s National Institute for Food and Agriculture Secondary Education, Two-Year Postsecondary Education, and Agriculture in the K-12 Classroom Challenge Grants Program grant program in 2019.
Texas A&M University, Blinn College, and San Luis Obispo have collaborated to deliver enhanced context-specific communication and decision-making/problem-solving curricula to students enrolled in secondary agricultural education courses. In a Crawford, Lang, Fink, Dalton, and Fielitz’s (2011) study, students, faculty, alumni, and employers ranked communication and decision-making/problem-solving skills as the top two, most-desired soft skills. However, when rating students’ preparedness as it relates to soft skills, employers noted they were neither prepared nor unprepared. Therefore, the primary audience of FMFW is high school agricultural education students and teachers. The secondary audience is community college and university faculty and food, agricultural, natural resources, and human sciences employers.
The primary benefits for students and teachers are access to multidisciplinary, agricultural industry-driven, and adaptable curricula focused on formal soft-skill training at the high school level. More than 800,000 students are currently enrolled in formal agricultural education programs across the 50 states and three U.S. territories (National FFA Organization, 2018). In addition, there are nearly 11,000 middle and high school agricultural teachers seeking to provide quality instruction for students’ career and technical collegiate pursuits (NAAE, 2018). Providing adaptable, formal soft-skill curricula instruction is vital to enhancing human capital. Curricula will be distributed through the National Council of Agricultural Education, eXtension, and the National FFA Organization.
All of the modules generated as a part of this project are a part of the Lab’s Agriculture and Life Sciences Communications Curriculum database.
Read more about this project and the modules available for educators and students in the latest issue of The Agricultural Education Magazine.
This project is supported by the Secondary Education, Two-Year Postsecondary Education, and Agriculture in the K-12 Classroom Challenge Grants Program no. 2019-38414-30265 from the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture.
CIG: Improve Outreach to Improve Soils
The impact that research makes depends on communication to stakeholders. In soil science, it is our responsibility to improve our communication with producers and inform them of our scientific discoveries related to soil health management practices. Each state has an established Extension service to disseminate research to producers, but research on what messages are most effective in influencing producer behavior is not often done.
Even more critical is facilitating knowledge transfer among producers who have experience with implementing soil health management practices and those who are interested in such practices. Increasing the effectiveness of transferring knowledge both through improved communication techniques and producer-to-producer networks has the potential to increase implementation of soil health management practices. Improve Outreach to Improve Soils: Combining Data, Economics, and Communication to Improve Soil Health Across the South Central United States was funded by USDA’s Natural Resource Conservation Service grant program in 2017.
The project will benefit all producers in the South Central U.S. by
- Providing producers the knowledge necessary to make decisions about what soil health management practice to implement.
- Serving as a model to other regions on what communication messages and modules may be effective in their areas and the type of information that is most useful to producers.
- Improving the current level of knowledge on soil health management practices across the South Central U.S., which is critical for making reliable recommendations to producers.
The project is a collaboration between Texas A&M University, Oklahoma State University, and Louisiana State University. The Department of Soil and Crop Sciences at Texas A&M University is leading the project.
This material is based upon work supported by the Natural Resources Conservation Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under number NR183A750008G013.
Biotechnology Communications for Journalists
Working with the Norman Borlaug Institute for International Agriculture, we assisted with developing and leading a two-week training program that exposed Indonesian journalists to the basic science of biotechnology and how to disseminate the information to the public in format that is easily palatable. The journalists visited corn and soybean farmers and biotechnology companies to enhance their ability to relay a positive message on biotechnology benefits. Through this program, journalists gained access to tools and resources to provide Indonesian citizens with a greater understanding of biotechnology benefits, which allows the Government to support policy, trade, and production of genetically engineered crops, and with the ability to safeguard biotechnology from being unnecessarily restricted by the agricultural sector.
- Leggette, H. R., Hall, S. T., & Murphrey, T. P. (2017). A case study of Indonesian journalists’ participation in a Cochran Fellowship Program focused on biotechnology and journalism. Journal of International Agricultural and Extension Education, 24(3), 52–66. doi: 10.5191/jiaee.2017.24305.
This project was supported by the USDA Foreign Agricultural Service.
#ChemicalAwareState
Farm safety is an increasing concern for citizens, agricultural producers, and agricultural educators. Safe farm chemical usage is a specific concern of the National Occupational Research Agenda Agriculture, Forestry, and Fishing Sector Council and Mississippi secondary agricultural educators. Our multi-institutional and interdisciplinary team combined agricultural communicators from Texas A&M University and agricultural educators from Mississippi State University to create educational outreach and social media deliverables that comprised a targeted outreach campaign to enhance farm chemical safety usage in Mississippi.
Funded by the Southeast Center for Agricultural Safety and Injury Prevention, we disseminated our content in September 2017 to coincide with National Farm Safety and Health Week, targeting secondary agricultural education students, preservice agricultural educators, and current agricultural educators in Mississippi as well as social media followers of statewide agricultural organizations in Mississippi.
The #ChemicalAwareState educational packet is available for free educational use.
This project was supported by the Southeast Center for Agricultural Health and Injury Prevention.
Communicating with Landowners Along the Texas Little River Watershed
“Bacteria is the No. 1 pollutant of water” in Texas (Foust, 2010, para. 1). Because the Big Elm Creek and San Gabriel River tributaries in Bell, Milam, and Falls counties have elevated levels of bacteria (TCEQ, 2014a, 2014b), the Texas Water Resources Institute had several ongoing projects along the Little River watershed. In an effort to understand the landowners along the watershed, we helped TWRI identify landowners’ preferred communication mediums, their preferred sources of information, and their preferred types of information.
- Dewald, S., Murphrey, T. P., Leggette, H. R., Berthold, A., & Wagner, K. (2019). Landowners’ motivations for and barriers to adopting water quality best management practices. Journal of Extension, 57(5).
- Dewald, S., Leggette, H. R., Murphrey, T. P., Berthold, A., & Wagner, K. (2018). Landowners’ communication preferences for receiving water-related information. Journal of Agricultural Education, 59(2), 343–369. doi: 10.5032/jae.2018.02343.
This project was supported by Clean Water Act Section 319(h) Nonpoint Source (NPS) Grant Program, grant no. 131527 SRS M1502190, from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.
TDA: Meet the Farmer
Specialty crops, including vegetables, fruit, tree nuts and more, are an important component of agriculture in Texas. The Texas Department of Agriculture works to support over 2,700 growers across the state and create awareness among Texas consumers about specialty crops. The Meet a Farmer project is an informative photo journalistic essay project that introduces Texas consumers to local and regional Texas specialty crop producers. The photodocumentary images depicted producers doing what they do on a typical day on their specialty crop operation.
Strengthen Student’s Communication Skills
This project was supported by the USDA Foreign Agricultpractitioners, and consumers. Strengthening Communication Skills of Agricultural Students: Using Real-World Examples to Meet Industry Employment Needs was funded by USDA’s National Institute for Food and Agriculture Higher Education Challenge grant program in 2017.
The Texas A&M University project team developed and delivered seven reusable learning modules (RLMs) to enhance the human capital of food, animal, nutrition, and health sciences by meeting the employment needs of industry. The curriculum focus on Crawford et al.’s (2011) seven communication characteristics, using industry-specific examples and learning opportunities that allow students to reflect and compare their communication techniques with industry expectations. Each module is available as an RLM and as a face-to-face curriculum package. The modules are hosted on the Texas A&M University Libraries’ The OAKTrust Digital Repository, and you can access the curriculum by accessing the Science Communications Teaching Resources page.
All of the modules generated as a part of this project are a part of the Lab’s Agriculture and Life Sciences Communications Curriculum database.
- Norris, S., Leggette, H. R., Murphrey, T. P., Richburg, A., &; Bush, M. (2020, September). Science communication: Context-specific reusable learning modules for strengthening students’ communication skills. NACTA Journal, Teaching Tips. https://www.nactateachers.org/images/TeachingTips/TT_2020-0248.pdf.
- Norris, S., Murphrey, T. P., & Leggette, H. R. (2019). Do they believe they can communicate? Assessing college students’ preparation for communicating about agricultural sciences. Journal of Agricultural Education, 60(4), 53–70. https://doi.org/10.5032/jae.2019.04053
Click here to access a list of modules that align with the writing intensive courses in the Texas A&M University College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.
This project was supported by Higher Education Challenge Grant no. 2017-70003-26386 from the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture.
Telling the Story of Science: Empowering Scientists to Communicate
Scientific innovations are essential to address complex social issues, but public misunderstanding of and lack of trust in science continue to be a problem. Effective communication between scientists and the public is critical to the advancement of science in meaningful ways. By identifying gaps in communication between scientists and the public and the best channels to engage with relevant publics, we can provide scientists with resources to communicate effectively with a diverse range of publics and to translate scientific discoveries for life-changing impacts.
- Parrella, J., Koswatta, T., Leggette, H., Ramasubramanian, S., & Rutherford, T. (2022). Teaching scientists to communicate: Developing science communication training based on scientists’ knowledge and self-reflectiveness. International Journal of Science Education: Part B Communication and Public Engagement, 12(3), 235–253. https://doi.org/10.1080/21548455.2022.2068809.
- Koswatta, T., Parrella, J., Leggette, H., Ramasubramanian, S., & Rutherford, T. (2022). Improving public science communication: A case study of scientists’ needs when communicating beyond the academy. International Journal of Science Education: Part B Communication and Public Engagement, 12(2), 174–191. https://doi.org/10.1080/21548455.2022.2055191.
This project was supported by the Texas A&M University President’s T3 Initiative.