Statisticians are objective, laconic souls who leave the cursing – or rejoicing – to others. The most positive reaction you are likely to get will involve referring to your position on a Gaussian distribution. I am happy to report therefore that your sizzling, soaraway Geoscientist is in the happy condition of finding itself exactly where it wishes to be – that is to say, right up your upper quartile.
The results of the readership survey, conducted for us by opinion research company Research by Design, reveal that (as already reported – Geoscientist 27.6 July) interest in the magazine is extremely high (compared to comparable magazines of other membership organizations). In fact, the level of reaction achieved seems to break all records.
Now that the quantitative survey has been analysed we can also reveal that a staggering 91% of you read the magazine either ‘regularly’ (63%) or ‘occasionally’. Of these, 59% have done so since joining, and 23% say you read it more now than in the past. Eighty-four percent of you rated our content either ‘very good’ (28%) or ‘good’, while 15% read it ‘cover-to-cover’, and 35% read ‘most’ articles (32% ‘some’, and 11% ‘one or two’).
Nearly 80% of you aged 27 or less (and up to 90% of older readers), strongly prefer the printed copy; about half of you ‘never’ look at Geoscientist online, except to search previous issues. Moreover, the proportion of ‘regular’ readers rises steadily with length of membership, from just over 75% of readers with under five years’ membership to almost 95% (over 50 years’ membership).
Most popular sections are Features (87%), Soapbox (64%) and the Editorial (58%). Nearly all of you find the magazine well designed, easy to read and up-to-date, choosing keywords (in order of frequency): ‘informative’, ‘easy read’, ‘topical’, ‘enjoyable’, ‘educational’, ‘engaging’, ‘entertaining’, ‘well-structured’, ‘well-designed’, ‘relevant’, ‘international’, and ‘outward-looking’.
Not everybody likes everything, of course: we cannot hope to please everyone all the time. Nevertheless, we will take on board your constructive comments and do what we can to accommodate them. We already share many of your expressed concerns. Not all will be possible, but where it is, we will do our best.
Thank you again for your enthusiastic participation. I trust that this issue lives up to the rest! Thanks to you, the Society now has a clear, objective picture of where the Fellowship magazine stands, after almost 20 years of gradual development – which is exactly what you need when deciding where to go next. To paraphrase a certain ex-Education Minister, who wanted one day to see all British schools ‘above average’, I look forward to the day when everything in Geoscientist falls in your upper quartile.
DR TED NIELD NUJ FGS, EDITOR
[email protected], @TedNield @geoscientistmag