Lab UK
Overview
Who: Nina Bell and Peter Harvey presented this case study which is a BBC project working in collaboration with academics from across the country.
What: Lab UK facilitates large scale public engagement in science, with one-off online experiments and tests. This case study explored creating a multiplatform campaign to open up mental health in partnership with Lab UK
Why: A particular focus in this project was to enable people to learn about mental health.
Where: Online at Lab uk
When: Launched September 2009. It is an ongoing project.
Project description
Lab UK is a BBC website where people can participate in groundbreaking scientific experiments. It opens science up to hundreds of thousands of participants, enabling the general public to help create new knowledge and answer big scientific questions. BBC Headroom joined forces with LAB UK to invite the BBC audience to help conduct the largest ever scientific experiment into the causes of stress.
Since 2001, the BBC has carried out more than 20 'one-off' experiments and tests online. The BBC aims to build on this legacy by bringing all future experiments together under a single brand - Lab UK. This will raise awareness of the online experiments, enable quicker design and roll-out, and create fascinating new ways to explore the data. As such, Lab UK experiments have the potential to reach very large numbers of participants.
Purpose
By promoting content on TV, radio and online, the BBC can reach larger numbers in broader demographics than is possible using conventional recruitment methodologies. And because the same participants may end up contributing to many Lab UK experiments over the life of the project, it creates interesting opportunities to explore correlations between experimental data sets.
Results/Outcomes
What worked well
Lab UK launched in September 2009 with the Brain Test Britain experiment, which aimed to answer the question: does brain training actually work? Many thousands of members of the public took part, making it the largest ever study of computer-based brain training. Since then, Lab UK has launched two further major experiments - The Big Personality Test and The Web Behaviour Test - both of which received a huge public response.
Each Lab UK experiment is designed in collaboration with leading scientists and high profile BBC programmes, such as Bang Goes the Theory, Child of Our Time and The Virtual Revolution. Scientists and academics are encouraged to submit ideas for possible inclusion as a Lab UK experiment via the website.
Resources required
Web designers, developers and producers, plus academic partners who can suggest ideas for appropriate experiments, and publish the results.
Top Tips
- Achieve a balance - Develop experiments that could be used on TV and look for things that give audience something as well as science
- Explain - People are much happier answering questions when they understand why they are being asked.
- Offer - Hands on activities and make use of existing technology, for example mobile phones
- Give feedback - feed results back to audience Need to get better at feeding back
- Get clearance - ethical clearance is the responsibility of the academic, and don't forget data protection.
- Share it - share some of the learning with wider community and ESRC
BBC Headroom is a campaign to help people to learn about mental health, get practical advice and seek further support.
Contact
Name: Peter Harvey
Name of organisation: BBC
Email: peter.harvey@bbc.co.uk or labuk.feedback@bbc.co.uk
