3M conducted a study that found visuals are processed in the brain over 60,000 times faster than text. There's overwhelming evidence that infographics are extremely effective at catching people's attention, and that sticking ability isn't going away.  Let me dive into the biological reason behind this. Our eyes are neurally networked to take in a visual scene in under 1 second while it takes 250 seconds to recognize, then assign meaning to symbols (think of each word in a sentence as a symbol).

I named a few, but the simple fact is that your brain craves infographics because we suffer from information overload: the average attention span has dropped to href="http://time.com/3858309/attention-spans-goldfish/" target="_blank">8 href="http://time.com/3858309/attention-spans-goldfish/">8  seconds since 1980. People only read href="https://www.nngroup.com/articles/how-little-do-users-read/" target="_blank">28% href="https://www.nngroup.com/articles/how-little-do-users-read/">28%  of what they see.  However, 80% of people are more willing to read an infographic--and they learn and retain information 32% better. Rather than spew statistics, I'll save you time and let you read in our infographic below.

First, let me lay some cold, hard facts:

-  More scientists apply are applying  every year to grants.

- Grant funding for grant funding, which  is declining

- declining every year.

2.  More PhDs graduate are graduating  ever year

- More year yet more and more  postdocs don't get aren't getting  tenureevery year  (6% in Europe)

Now, Europe).

Now,  let me ask a question:

Why ask: Why  are 36 52 out of the 36  million people on Academia and 9 million on ResearchGate (of which 52 are ResearchGate  Nobel Laureates)?

It's Laureates?

It's  become quite clear that writing papers and getting grants won't cut it anymore.  Many tenure-track professors, especially in more basic (rather than applied) science areas, argue that layperson outreach and science communication are superfluous extensions of "cold, hard science" (see Reddit thread). To such skeptics, let me point out a correlation, and to that, attach a hypothesis:

Correlation: Funding for science is dropping along with public perception of scientists.

Hypothesis: The above is not merely correlation; rather, causation.

Here's the cycle of science: Policymakers create grants for science -> Scientists conduct and publish research using grants -> This research molds public opinion on science -> Public opinion influences policy makers. This explains why climate change researchers recently saw a cut in their funding, with low layperson education on climate change. Many scientists have realized this trend: the burst in scientists using social media and academic networks to build a personal, scientific brand is a testament to it.

Infographics are a great way to attract a larger audience, both laypeople and scientists alike. While the public outreach is more important to scientists in fields like environmental science and public health, the benefits for other career-track scientists are undeniable: people who have created infographics with PubDraw have seen over an average of 1.6 more citations and 10X more social engagement.