THINKING LIKE A JOURNALIST: HOW A REPORTER COMMUNICATES ON CONTENTIOUS ISSUES

Is The Big One coming? Are vaccines safe? Can I blame today’s heat wave on global warming? Did that restaurant really give me food poisoning? Any expert can often be asked questions about contentious issues, and it can easily become a challenge on what to communicate. Rong-Gong Lin II, a reporter at the Los Angeles Times who likes talking to scientists and writing about peril, chats about the gap between what some scientists say sometimes and what the public needs to know.