Scientific Metaphors in the journalistic discourse

TL;DR

This paper examines how scientific metaphors in journalism influence public understanding, classifies different types of metaphors, and analyzes their use in physics-related discourse on Brazilian media to improve science communication.

Contribution

It proposes a new classification of scientific metaphors and provides an in-depth analysis of their application in contemporary journalism, especially in physics metaphors related to social phenomena.

Findings

Classification of visible, invisible, basic, and derived metaphors.

Analysis of physics metaphors in Brazilian journalistic portals.

Implications for science education and dissemination.

Abstract

Scientific education and divulgation not only amplify people's vocabulary and repertory of scientific concepts but, at the same time, promote the diffusion of certain conceptual and cognitive metaphors. Here we make some hypothesis about this process, proposing a classification in terms of visible, invisible, basic and derived metaphors. We focus our attention in contemporary and classical physics metaphors applied to psychological and socio-economical phenomena, and we study two exemplar cases through an exhaustive exam of the online content of large Brazilian journalistic portals. Finally, we present implications and suggestions from the cognitive metaphor theory for the scientific education and divulgation process.