{"id":2209,"date":"2025-01-15T16:35:27","date_gmt":"2025-01-15T21:35:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cdci.w3.uvm.edu\/blog\/?page_id=2209"},"modified":"2025-01-15T16:35:29","modified_gmt":"2025-01-15T21:35:29","slug":"video-abstracts-and-plain-language-summaries-are-more-effective-than-graphical-abstracts-and-published-abstracts","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/cdci.w3.uvm.edu\/blog\/research\/research-summaries\/video-abstracts-and-plain-language-summaries-are-more-effective-than-graphical-abstracts-and-published-abstracts\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;Video abstracts and plain language summaries are more effective than graphical abstracts and published abstracts.&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<section class=\"featured-cta-block d-flex uvm-block wp-full-width bg-gray\" id=\"CTA\">\n  <div class=\"container-fluid\">\n    <div class=\"row overview-columns align-items-center\">\n      <div class=\"col-12 col-md-6 details\">\n        <p class=\"overline\">Recommended Research Summary, December 2023<\/p>        <h2 class=\"h3\">Measuring how people like to access research findings<\/h2>        <p>This is a summary of:<\/p>\n<p>Bredbenner, K, Simon SM (2019). Video abstracts and plain language summaries are more effective than graphical abstracts and published abstracts.\u00a0<em>PLoS ONE<\/em>\u00a012(11): e0224697. DOI;\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1371\/journal.pone.0224697\">Doi.org\/10.1371\/journal.pone.0224697<\/a><\/p>\n\n                <ul class=\"buttons-list\">\n                      <li><a href=\"https:\/\/cdci.w3.uvm.edu\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/Bredbenner-and-Simon-Research-Summary-v2.pdf\" target=\"\" class=\"btn btn-primary\">Download a plain-language .pdf of this summary<\/a><\/li>\n                      <li><a href=\"https:\/\/cdci.w3.uvm.edu\/blog\/cdciresources\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2023\/12\/video-abstracts-and-plain-language-are-effective.mp3\" target=\"\" class=\"btn btn-primary\">Listen to an audio version of this summary (.mp3)<\/a><\/li>\n                  <\/ul>\n              <\/div>\n\n      <div class=\"col-12 col-md-6 media\">\n        <figure>\n          <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"750\" height=\"500\" src=\"https:\/\/cdci.w3.uvm.edu\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/bredbenner-webframe.001-750x500.png\" class=\"attachment-three-two-md size-three-two-md\" alt=\"Thumbnail of Bredbenner research poster\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cdci.w3.uvm.edu\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/bredbenner-webframe.001-750x500.png 750w, https:\/\/cdci.w3.uvm.edu\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/bredbenner-webframe.001-1500x1000.png 1500w, https:\/\/cdci.w3.uvm.edu\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/bredbenner-webframe.001-120x80.png 120w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 750px) 100vw, 750px\" \/>        <\/figure>\n      <\/div>\n    <\/div>\n  <\/div>\n<\/section>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">What was this study about?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Most research includes a short summary of the work, called an \u201cabstract\u201d. And most abstracts are text, written with a lot of technical language and jargon. This study looked at what happens if researchers present research summaries as either a video, a plain-language summary, or a graphic. They wanted to know:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Would people like those kinds of abstracts better than the regular written kind?<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Would those kinds of abstracts make research more accessible?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>The researchers learned that people liked videos the best. Videos were also the format where people scored the highest on the quizzes, and the most people wanted more of them. People liked plain-language abstracts second-best. This was true regardless of what type of career the person was in.<\/p>\n\n\n<section id=\"accordion-block_205fb9bdd4022b72330cfc09b7333d30\" class=\"accordion-block\">\n\n  <div class=\"card\">\n    <div class=\"card-header\" id=\"heading1\">\n      <a class=\"collapsed d-flex align-items-center justify-content-between\" data-toggle=\"collapse\" data-target=\"#accordion-block_205fb9bdd4022b72330cfc09b7333d301\" aria-expanded=\"true\" aria-controls=\"accordion-block_205fb9bdd4022b72330cfc09b7333d301\" href=\"#\">\n        <h3>What did the researchers do?<\/h3>\n        <i class=\"fa-plus fa-regular fa-sharp\" aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/i>\n      <\/a>\n    <\/div>\n\n    <div id=\"accordion-block_205fb9bdd4022b72330cfc09b7333d301\" class=\"collapse\" aria-labelledby=\"heading1\">\n      <div class=\"card-body\">\n        <p>The researchers took two similar research studies on HIV and blood, and they made a video, a plain-language summary, and a graphic summary for each of them. The researchers showed<br \/>\nthese summaries to 538 people.<\/p>\n<p>Then they:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>asked each participant how much they liked the kind of summary they were given<\/li>\n<li>asked each participant what kind of summaries they usually liked<\/li>\n<li>and they gave each participant a quiz on the content.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>They also asked each participant whether they worked in science, in a science-related field, in a non-science field, or whether they were a student.<\/p>\n      <\/div>\n    <\/div>\n  <\/div>\n  <div class=\"card\">\n    <div class=\"card-header\" id=\"heading2\">\n      <a class=\"collapsed d-flex align-items-center justify-content-between\" data-toggle=\"collapse\" data-target=\"#accordion-block_205fb9bdd4022b72330cfc09b7333d302\" aria-expanded=\"true\" aria-controls=\"accordion-block_205fb9bdd4022b72330cfc09b7333d302\" href=\"#\">\n        <h3>What did the researchers learn?<\/h3>\n        <i class=\"fa-plus fa-regular fa-sharp\" aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/i>\n      <\/a>\n    <\/div>\n\n    <div id=\"accordion-block_205fb9bdd4022b72330cfc09b7333d302\" class=\"collapse\" aria-labelledby=\"heading2\">\n      <div class=\"card-body\">\n        <p>The researchers found that people liked videos the best. Videos were also the format where people scored the highest on the quizzes, and the most people wanted more of them. People liked plain-language abstracts second-best. This was true regardless of what type of career the person was in.<\/p>\n<p>People in the study told the researchers that they felt like they understood the most from video summaries and plain-language summaries equally. When the researchers looked at everyone\u2019s quiz scores, it was true: videos and plain-language summaries appear to help people understand more information than the graphic, or the regular text abstracts.<\/p>\n<p>And this was true regardless of what type of career the person was in.<\/p>\n<p>And even when people in the study said they didn\u2019t like videos the best, they still scored high on the quiz.<\/p>\n      <\/div>\n    <\/div>\n  <\/div>\n  <div class=\"card\">\n    <div class=\"card-header\" id=\"heading3\">\n      <a class=\"collapsed d-flex align-items-center justify-content-between\" data-toggle=\"collapse\" data-target=\"#accordion-block_205fb9bdd4022b72330cfc09b7333d303\" aria-expanded=\"true\" aria-controls=\"accordion-block_205fb9bdd4022b72330cfc09b7333d303\" href=\"#\">\n        <h3>What does this mean for real life?<\/h3>\n        <i class=\"fa-plus fa-regular fa-sharp\" aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/i>\n      <\/a>\n    <\/div>\n\n    <div id=\"accordion-block_205fb9bdd4022b72330cfc09b7333d303\" class=\"collapse\" aria-labelledby=\"heading3\">\n      <div class=\"card-body\">\n        <p>Right now, most professional research journals provide summaries that have a lot of jargon, and complicated language. But this research study points to videos and plain-language summaries as maybe being a better way to help people understand and be interested in professional research. This research shows that more journals should try sharing their abstracts as videos and plain-language summaries.<\/p>\n<p>The researchers also want to see more research into how the quality of the summary relates to how well people understand the study.<\/p>\n      <\/div>\n    <\/div>\n  <\/div>\n  <div class=\"card\">\n    <div class=\"card-header\" id=\"heading4\">\n      <a class=\"collapsed d-flex align-items-center justify-content-between\" data-toggle=\"collapse\" data-target=\"#accordion-block_205fb9bdd4022b72330cfc09b7333d304\" aria-expanded=\"true\" aria-controls=\"accordion-block_205fb9bdd4022b72330cfc09b7333d304\" href=\"#\">\n        <h3>What are the limitations of this study?<\/h3>\n        <i class=\"fa-plus fa-regular fa-sharp\" aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/i>\n      <\/a>\n    <\/div>\n\n    <div id=\"accordion-block_205fb9bdd4022b72330cfc09b7333d304\" class=\"collapse\" aria-labelledby=\"heading4\">\n      <div class=\"card-body\">\n        <ul>\n<li>While the study did include more than 500 people, the study did only look at two papers. To make strong recommendations, the study should be run with lots of other papers.<\/li>\n<li>The researchers did not offer audio-only summaries as an option, so we don\u2019t know if audio summaries are better than video or plain-language text.<\/li>\n<li>The graphics that the researchers offered were one plain image with no text. The researchers are curious whether infographics would do better.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n      <\/div>\n    <\/div>\n  <\/div>\n<\/section>\n\n\n<section class=\"info-highlights-block d-flex uvm-block wp-full-width bg-gray\" id=\"Highlights\">\n  <div class=\"container-fluid\">\n    <div class=\"row overview-row\">\n      <div class=\"col-12 col-lg-10 details\">\n                <h2>Why is this research important?<\/h2>        <p>This study supports the idea that research should be available in many different formats, not just text. This makes it more likely that researchers will release their studies in different formats.<\/p>\n      <\/div>\n    <\/div>\n\n        <div class=\"info-highlights-grid row\">\n            <div class=\"info-highlight col-12 col-md-6 col-lg-4\">\n        <span class=\"highlight-icon\"><i class=\"fa-sharp fa-regular fa-circle-info\" aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/i><\/span>\n        <h3>Summary Author<\/h3>        <p><strong>Audrey Homan MA CPACC<\/strong>, UVM Center on Disability &amp; Community Inclusion<\/p>\n      <\/div>\n            <div class=\"info-highlight col-12 col-md-6 col-lg-4\">\n        <span class=\"highlight-icon\"><i class=\"fa-sharp fa-solid fa-headphones\" aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/i><\/span>\n        <h3>Audio Summary<\/h3>        <ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/cdci.w3.uvm.edu\/blog\/cdciresources\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2023\/12\/video-abstracts-and-plain-language-are-effective.mp3\">Listen to an audio version of this summary (.mp3)<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n      <\/div>\n          <\/div>\n      <\/div>\n<\/section>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What was this study about? Most research includes a short summary of the work, called an \u201cabstract\u201d. And most abstracts are text, written with a lot of technical language and &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":218,"menu_order":6,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-2209","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.3 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>&quot;Video abstracts and plain language summaries are more effective than graphical abstracts and published abstracts.&quot; - UVM Center on Disability &amp; Community Inclusion (CDCI)<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/cdci.w3.uvm.edu\/blog\/research\/research-summaries\/video-abstracts-and-plain-language-summaries-are-more-effective-than-graphical-abstracts-and-published-abstracts\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"&quot;Video abstracts and plain language summaries are more effective than graphical abstracts and published abstracts.&quot; - UVM Center on Disability &amp; Community Inclusion (CDCI)\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"What was this study about? 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