Adding CATE makes a science presentation interesting, informative, and entertaining.  

Improving the quality of every oral presentation is a desire of all researchers as well as a goal of the Chalk Talk Science Project (CTS) since 2012.  Storytelling is a powerful tool to explain complex information in ways that any audience can understand and remember.  Building on the value of storytelling in entertainment and business, CTS has found ways to integrate storytelling into science presentations.  Talking to professional speakers, stand-up comics, advanced Toastmasters, and authors, it became clear that science was perfectly structured for telling stories.  Namely, just like stories, science has a beginning, middle and end.  Science reports have an introduction/material and methods (beginning), results (middle), and conclusion/discussion (end).  However, as we witnessed at many conferences, oral presentations given as reports are often terribly boring, too detailed, and don’t emotionally connect with the audience…i.e., they don’t stick. 

As a derivative of the advice in the book, Made To Stick, about 5 years ago CTS identified and began teaching researchers how to change a report into a story that would become “sticky” by adding four overarching elements: characters, action, tension, and emotion (CATE).  A short description of the CATE elements is listed below. CATE makes the researcher and results come alive and be remembered by the audience.  Presentations using CATE are more interesting, informative, and entertaining.  The feedback from participants taking CTS workshops as well as from fellow colleagues teaching science communication indicate that adding CATE transforms their report into an exciting story.  CATE engages both the audience and speaker. Some learners mention that telling a story with CATE is so much fun it helps them overcome the fear of public speaking. 

The story structure in which CATE is added is the same as that taught in most acting, film and writing classes.  The speaker can choose whatever structure works best.  In the CTS courses, we teach the COMPASS Message Box to summarize the message, and structure it using the Story Spine of Kenn Adams and the ABT of Randy Olson.  Essentially, this nicely incorporates the basic parts of a story: the setup (the problem, who or what was involved, where and why), what happened (the research journey), what was learned (experimental successes & failures), and what this new knowledge means (the benefits of the story to the audience and speaker). 

Here is a brief description of CATE elements: 

Characters:  Science doesn’t just happen like spontaneous generation.  People do experiments, and to humanize the presentation is to talk about the people who are involved the research.  The main character might be the speaker, or it might be co-workers on the research project.  The story might be told from the viewpoint of advisors, funders, friends, family, or foes who helped or hindered the progress of the research.  Characters need not be human… for example, stories told from the perspective of the mouse who gets injected (ouch!) with the vaccine or the cancer cells in culture that get poisoned by toxic chemicals make wonderful characters for a science story.  Adding dialogue, either internal or external to the speaker, adds to the enjoyment of the story.  Character development helps build speaker credibility and audience trust.

Action:  Static data is a snapshot of the world … a moment in time… and quickly becomes dull.  On the other hand, the acquisition of data is a sequence of events that occur over time…and provides a compelling and entertaining description of the research process to the audience.  Adding verbs to a report is critical for leading the audience into the world of science and helping them understand what happened to eventually get those data.  Action can evoke emotions such as suspense, excitement, or awe, making the science story more emotionally resonant.  Action scenes ground the science in practical, tangible contexts.

Tension:  Tension is a fundamental element of storytelling. The audience likes to know that scientists are human and suffer the same pains as the rest of us.  Misery does love company!  When the speaker talks of the mistakes made, time lost, money needed, clock ticking, and pushback by their leaders, we listen!   Tension is crucial for stories because it creates anticipation (what’s next?), drives the plot forward, maintaining a sense of urgency (can the conflict be resolved? Will there be personal growth in the characters?), and keeps the audience engaged (eliciting emotion from the audience and providing a cathartic release for both the characters and the audience). 

Emotion:  While science is often perceived as a purely rational and objective field, emotions play a significant role in how people perceive and connect with information. Including emotions in a science report acknowledges the human aspect of scientific inquiry and communication, fostering a deeper connection between scientists and other humans.  As humans, neuroscientists and social scientists have discovered our brains are wired to connect to others through emotions.   Emotions are a very real part of science … we feel things like anger, frustration, shock, disgust, fear, surprise, and happiness.  Adding emotions to a science report can be beneficial for audience engagement, connection to the speaker or topic, memory retention, and persuasion.  However, the science story should not become over dramatic, and emotions should complement the factual information rather than overshadow it, maintaining scientific integrity and accuracy.

In summary, making a science oral presentation stick with the audience requires logical structure (e.g., ABT), clear, understandable evidence (but not overwhelming detail), and exciting stories that include CATE. 

Dennis F. Mangan, Ph.D.      www.chalktalkscience.org                 March 2024