Storylines for practice: a visual storytelling approach to strengthen the science-practice interface

A growing number of scientific publications is available to promote sustainable river management. However, these publications target researchers rather than water management professionals who are responsible for the implementation of management practices. To bridge this science-to-practice gap, we conceptualize and propose a series of steps to prepare effective storylines targeted at a practitioner audience. We developed this approach within a research program that supports integrated and collaborative river management. We prepared three storylines, each based on one scientific publication. The storylines combined text and interactive visuals using the ESRI StoryMaps tool to make them available online. Via focus groups with 44 participants from research and practice, we evaluated the perceived usefulness of and engagement with the content and design. We collected feedback from participants using a survey as well as via audio and screen recordings. Our findings show that we should narrow down the audience of the storylines by tailoring them to the needs of project managers rather than specialized advisors. Therefore, the content should offer more than a visual summary of the research by showing examples of the management application. A more engaging sequence with a clear protagonist is further required to better relate to the problem and the potential application. Although visuals and interactive elements were considered attractive, a multi-disciplinary editorial team is necessary to better complement the visuals design to the text. The level of detail of participants feedback shows that involving project managers to co-create storylines can be an important step for improvement. © 2020, The Author(s).

This research is part of the research program RiverCare and is financed by NWO-TTW and the Ministry of Economic Affairs under grant number P12-14. Marcela Brugnach is further supported by the spanish government through María de Maeztu excellence accreditation 2018–2022 (Ref. MDM-2017–0714) of BC3. We greatly acknowledge the focus group participants and hosting organizations for their valuable input. We also thank RiverCare researchers, supervisory team members Fedor Baart and Mascha van der Voort as well as collaborators Emanuele Fantini and Roland Postma for their support to implement the findings of this study. Finally, we greatly appreciate the valuable comments of reviewers for improving this manuscript