The dissemination of scientific and clinical information has traditionally been in print format, but the advent of the Internet and electronic publishing has revolutionized the way in which we share new knowledge. Despite the advantages of rapid dissemination and the convenience of sharing publications internationally, online publishing comes with its own headaches. Approximately 2.5 million academic papers are published every year,1 so increasing the visibility of new publications can be challenging. Knowledge mobilization is critical for research to inform pharmacy practice or change policy, but only if it is discoverable. We are familiar with promoting our work through social media and on research social networking sites such as ResearchGate. The common practices of sharing via Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn may increase an article’s reach based on the number of article views and downloads, citations and author profile views,2,3 but what is the next level? Besides publishing in the Canadian Pharmacists Journal, you may improve the reach and exposure of your paper by supplementing the text with a visual representation, sometimes called a visual abstract or infographic.
Human brains are designed to process visual data quickly and to identify concepts.4 With 65% of the population as visual learners,5 using visual elements in articles to tell the story can be more persuasive. A University of Minnesota/3M study found that presentations with visual aids were 43% more compelling than those that did not have visual support, leading to improved audience attention, comprehension and retention and even influencing audience action.6 In scholarly publishing, visual representations can take several forms and are commonly described as infographics. Infographics are combinations of images, data and text to represent information in a simplified format. The Journal of the American College of Cardiology launched Central Illustrations in 2014 as a way of capturing the main findings of an article. See Figure 1 for a sample Central Illustration relating to the effectiveness of community pharmacist prescribing in cardiovascular risk reduction.7
Figure 1.
Sample Central Illustration from the Journal of the American College of Cardiology
Visual abstracts are infographics for original research that pull key findings and results from the abstract of a paper.8 They are intended not to replace the written abstract or act as a substitute for the full-text article but rather to help readers decide whether they would like to read the full article.9 Surgical journals were early adopters of visual abstracts, first using them in 2016,10 and this has gained traction in other disciplines, including urology and geriatrics.11,12
Evidence shows that visual abstracts help attract social media attention. As the pioneer of integrating visual abstracts into the scholarly landscape, the Annals of Surgery conducted a study to see whether there was a notable difference in engagement between tweets with and without visual abstracts.10 Of the 44 original research articles that were analyzed, the tweets with the visual abstracts had 8 times more retweets and views than the tweets without the visual images. People were also 2.7 times more likely to click on the link to access the full text from the visual abstract tweet.
In another study, the authors conducted a comparison analysis between 2 tweets promoting the same research article, one from the journal’s Twitter profile without a visual abstract and one from the lead author’s Twitter profile with a visual abstract.12 Both Twitter accounts had a similar number of followers (~3000) and levels of activity (~1800 to 1900 tweets) on the social media platform. Over the span of one week, the original tweet from the journal’s profile received almost 25,000 impressions, 17 retweets and 36 likes.12 In less than a week’s time, the lead author’s tweet using the visual abstract received close to 170,000 impressions, 81 retweets and 100 likes,12 which was significant. In half the time, the visual abstract tweet received more than 6 times the level of engagement compared to the tweet without a visual. There may be other factors contributing to the increased engagement on the lead author’s profile. For example, personal accounts are likely to have more engagement than organizational or institutional accounts since there is an individual attached to the profile. Twitter is designed as a networking tool, and it is much easier to connect with others and build relationships when there is an identifiable person behind the Twitter profile. Institutional accounts are faceless—we are uncertain who is behind the account activity. Notwithstanding the other factors at play, visual abstracts are a quick way to convey the key message behind the research article and capture the users’ attention.
Developing a good visual abstract
Even if the journals to which you are submitting papers do not have a structure in place to help you develop a visual abstract or infographic, you can create your own visualization to supplement the narrative. The guidelines below provide some good practices on how to develop a visual abstract (adapted from Lindquist and Ramirez-Zohfeld12):
1) Include the citation.
It is important to direct viewers to the original source so they know that the information is from an authoritative publisher and a peer-reviewed journal. Similar to any reference found in the bibliography of an article, the citation should include author names, article title, journal name and DOI where available.
2) Use PowerPoint as a platform.
PowerPoint is a popular tool with which most researchers are familiar. It is a program that can easily be used to create flow charts and diagrams and to insert graphics/images.
3) Know your audience.
Think carefully about who is the main audience of the research. Design the visualization with the target audience in mind. If you were creating a visual abstract for a pharmacy practice journal, it might not be as important to highlight the scientific details of the study but, rather, to focus on how the findings may influence policy-makers or change current practice.
4) Highlight the main message.
Due to the limited space available on the visual abstract, include the key message in a prominent location such as near the top of the abstract or aligned in the central column as one would imagine on an academic poster. Since the visual abstract will be shared on social media, viewers tend to spend a short amount of time scrolling through content, so a simple, eye-catching visualization would be more effective.
5) Consider accessibility issues.
To minimize accessibility challenges for viewers (i.e., colour blindness, colour contrast, preserving text as real text, setting reading order, etc.), choose colour schemes and pictures cautiously. Refer to available resources for accessibility tips and techniques.13,14
Adding a visual abstract or infographic to your article can help disseminate your findings, improve adoption of clinical innovations and maximize your research impact. In the future, CPJ will try to include as many of these visualizations as possible. ■
References
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