Analyzing festival-based public engagement with research: Developing and testing an impact framework for understanding audience responses to science festivals in Europe

Public engagement festivals offer rare opportunities for researchers and citizens to converse, yet organisers often lack robust evidence about whether such events change audience perceptions. Repeated measures surveys were used during European Researchers’ Night festivals in Malta and Ireland to explore how attending audiences perceive “research” and “researchers.” Open-ended responses were collected before the events and again afterwards and then analysed inductively using grounded-theory techniques to generate a set of thematic codes. Those codes were distilled into an indicators framework that categorises positive, negative and neutral perceptions of both research and researchers. The framework was piloted quantitatively to assess whether indicators linked to the European Commission’s expected impacts appeared more frequently after the events. Results showed that positive perceptions of research increased, particularly awareness of its social value, while perceptions of researchers were more ambivalent. The indicator-based approach also highlighted where stereotypes endured or where respondents remained uncertain. These findings provide organisers with a concise set of evidence-based indicators for evaluating festival impacts and suggest that pairing open-ended research with structured measures can improve the efficiency, reliability and generalisability of public engagement evaluations. Future applications should test the framework across diverse settings and investigate how to reach audiences who are not already positively disposed toward science.

Science festivals aim to bring researchers and the public together, but organisers often have little evidence about whether such events change how people think about research or researchers. This study addressed that gap by developing and testing a new way of measuring audience responses, based on a European Commission priority to understand the benefits of research and reduce stereotypes about researchers.

Surveys were carried out at European Researchers’ Night events in Malta and Ireland between 2017 and 2019. Visitors were asked open-ended questions about what comes to mind when they think of “research” and “researchers” before the events, and again afterwards. These answers were analysed to identify common themes, both positive (such as recognising research’s value to society), negative (such as scepticism or stereotypes), and neutral (such as factual descriptions). These themes were then turned into a concise “indicator framework” – a checklist of measurable impacts that could be applied in other events.

When this framework was applied to the survey data, results showed an overall increase in positive perceptions of research, particularly greater awareness of its importance and benefits. Perceptions of researchers also improved in some areas, especially reducing stereotypes and recognising problem-solving abilities, but many responses remained neutral. Negative views were rare, but some stereotypes and doubts persisted.

The approach demonstrates how organisers can convert the richness of open-ended feedback into structured, repeatable measures that save time and make comparisons across events easier. While the findings suggest that these festivals work well for people already interested in science, they also highlight the need for further efforts to reach those who are less engaged. This framework can be adapted for other public engagement contexts, such as science museums or online events, to better assess and improve their impact on public understanding of research.