Why scientists use social media
Over the past few weeks, as part of my Churchill Fellowship , I've been speaking to scientists across the US and Canada about their motivations for using social media. It has been interesting to hear what motivated them to start and their motivations to continue. The reasons scientists made the first step in setting up social media accounts for professional use have included being 'told to get online/start a Twitter account' by research funders or their institutions; to voice general frustrations and/or connect with others outside of their immediate research lab; because they heard it was 'a good thing to do' from others or they wanted to connect with the public about their work. For many, it is of course a combination of those reasons. Very few started out with an aim or vision of what they wanted to achieve. Their navigation of the networks and their choice of network was determined by what they were told to do (e.g. 'get on Twitter') or by wo