Poster Presentations

Poster

Presentation

Procedure

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What is a poster session?

Science fair for grown ups

Why have poster sessions? Efficiency!

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What is the purpose of poster presentations?

Overt – sharing of research Covert – Networking!

Creating collegiality/connections among practitioners

Fishing for graduate students and post docs

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The three parts of posters prep are?

Creating a Successful Poster Preparing the “Presentation” Knowing the Procedure

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Posters are made for the eyes.

The poster is a

of your research. The audience is on the move, not sitting still. Thus, visual appeal is critically important.

BALANCE Text and Graphics.Most common error of new poster makers: too much text that is too small to read

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Creating the Poster: prep

Prepare Text Title + Affiliation Abstract (use all) Introduction Methods Results Discussion

For IMRD, write a short text and bulleted points

Choose Graphics Background image

that matches theme of research

All of or excerpt of survey/s

Graphs of key results

Relevant photos

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Creating the Poster: layout

Overall layout of poster depends on what you want to convey to audience What it most important? What is most persuasive? Great Web-based help:

Michael Alley-- http://www.writing.engr.psu.edu/posters.html

Colin Purrington -- http://colinpurrington.com/tips/academic/posterdesign

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Creating the Poster: design & process 3 or 4 “panel” design with several ways to

organize poster Use PowerPoint

Sketch out by hand first Set slide size in Page Set up for 44” (width) x

36” (height) (or whatever poster session requires) Lay out whole poster using text boxes with 15%-

20% (or whole page) “view” Enlarge to 25%-50% to work on individual parts Save frequently! Check whole poster for balance before printing Print in CSE lab or Arch lab for $12 --

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Posters require performance.

Yes, Virginia, there is still a “presentation”! But it’s… Conversational – “chatting” about your research

where you are the expert

YET… Still a Dialogue – cannot hog the floor

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Presenting the Poster: prep

PRIME DIRECTIVE:

For each section of your work, be able to answer the wh-questions: who, what, when, why, where, how

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Presenting the Poster: prep

Prepare and Practice a 45-60 second response to the killer* question: “So, tell me about your research”. One sentence each: Topic + significance of topic Research Question Methods Results Discussion

* the preeminent fishing question!11

Presenting the Poster: killer question example

Given the rate of divorce [TOPIC] which is about 50% of all marriages [SIGNIFICANCE], I wanted to examine whether young people believe that living together before marriage enhances the chance of marital success [RESEARCH QUESTION].  I designed a questionnaire which included some yes/no questions, some likert scale questions, and a semantic differential which I then distributed to a college population [METHOD]. Overall, participants revealed an interesting contrast between a fairly high acceptance of cohabitation as positive for many aspects of a relationship such as working out household duties and increasing intimacy while still having some doubts about the desirability of a mate who'd lived with former partners [RESULT].  This suggests that among young unmarried people, beliefs about cohabitation are actually pretty similar to beliefs about marriage -- where men and women prefer to live with someone who is committed to the relationship but who hasn't had too many previous live-in relationships [DISCUSSION].

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Presenting the Poster: Qs

Plan for other open-ended questions: What is most important/significant about

your research? What should happen next? How does this relate to the field? Any practical applications?

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Steps for success include:

Bring 20-50 copies of handout with copy of poster on one side (color if you can afford it) and brief summary of project, short list of sources, and your contact info on the other

Other material if applicable (copy of survey instrument, brochures, etc).

Stand next to poster and smile!

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Presenting Posters: questions?

Qs?

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