Effective Slide Design for Research Presentations
Turning a research paper into a visual presentation is difficult. There are pitfalls, and navigating the path to a brief, informative presentation takes time and practice. Presentations are nerve-wracking for many, but a perfectly composed slide deck can make the process much easier.
Clearly and impactfully presenting your findings to the right audience at the right conference can improve communication of your science, enhance your career prospects, and attract potential collaborators. As a TA for GEO/WRI 201: Methods in Data Analysis & Scientific Writing this past fall, I saw how this process works from an instructor’s standpoint. I’ve presented my own research before, but helping others present theirs taught me a bit more about the process.
In general, your presentation will always benefit from more practice, more feedback, and more revision. It is hard to know how to revise your presentation if you never practice. By practicing in front of friends, you can get comfortable with presenting your work while receiving feedback. If you are presenting to a general audience, getting feedback from someone outside of your discipline is crucial.
Key Strategies for Effective Slide Design
1. Limit the Scope
Don’t present your paper. Presentations are usually around 10 min long. You will not have time to explain all of the research you did in a semester (or a year!) in such a short span of time. Instead, focus on the highlight(s). You will not have time to explain all of the research you did. Instead, focus on the highlights. Limit the scope of your presentation, the number of slides, and the text on each slide. In general, about one slide per minute of presentation is an appropriate budget. Having fewer slides is usually better as well.
GEO/WRI 201 teacher Amanda Irwin Wilkins introduced me to the iceberg analogy: like the iceberg, the vast majority of research stays ‘beneath the water’; only a select portion is visible to audiences. Achieving this balance is not easy. It can be frustrating to present only a fraction of your work and difficult to identify which aspects belong above water.
In my experience, text works well for organizing slides, orienting the audience to key terms, and annotating important figures-not for explaining complex ideas.
The iceberg analogy illustrates that only a small portion of research is visible during a presentation.
2. Craft a Compelling Narrative
After identifying the focused research question, walk your audience through your research as if it were a story. Orient the audience and draw them in by demonstrating the relevance and importance of your research story with strong global motive. Provide them with the necessary vocabulary and background knowledge to understand the plot of your story. Introduce the key studies (characters) relevant in your story and build tension and conflict with scholarly and data motive.
Nimra Nadeem ’21 researched post-wildfire vegetation recovery in GEO/WRI 201. The methods section should transition smoothly and logically from the introduction. Beware of presenting your methods in a boring, arc-killing, ‘this is what I did.’ Focus on the details that set your story apart from the stories other people have already told. Keep the audience interested by clearly motivating your decisions based on your original research question or the tension built in your introduction. Less is usually more here.
3. Highlight Key Results and Discussion
Only present results which are clearly related to the focused research question you are presenting. Make sure you explain the results clearly so that your audience understands what your research found. By now your audience should be dying for a satisfying resolution. Here is where you contextualize your results and begin resolving the tension between past research. Be thorough. Return back to your initial research question and motive, resolving any final conflicts and tying up loose ends.
Leave the audience with a clear resolution of your focus research question, and use unresolved tension to set up potential sequels (i.e.
4. Emphasize Visuals
Visual presentations should be dominated by clear, intentional graphics. Subtle animation in key moments (usually during the results or discussion) can add drama to the narrative arc and make conflict resolutions more satisfying. You are narrating a story written in images, videos, cartoons, and graphs. While your paper is mostly text, with graphics to highlight crucial points, your slides should be the opposite. Adapting to the new medium may require you to create or acquire far more graphics than you included in your paper, but it is necessary to create an engaging presentation.
Example of a visual presentation
5. Practice and Revise
The most important thing you can do for your presentation is to practice and revise. Bother your friends, your roommates, TAs-anybody who will sit down and listen to your work. Beyond that, think about presentations you have found compelling and try to incorporate some of those elements into your own. Remember you want your work to be comprehensible; you aren’t creating experts in 10 minutes. Above all, try to stay passionate about what you did and why. You put the time in, so show your audience that it’s worth it.
Additional Tips for Engaging Presentations
- First, take the time to outline what you want to say before creating your slide deck.
- Ensure that your visuals are appropriate for presenting to a large group of people in an auditorium or spacious room.
- Label and explain any visuals that you use. Consider making handouts for complicated charts, graphs, or pictures.
- Eliminate superfluous detail from scientific figures. If using videos, make sure that they are not too long in relation to the overall length of your presentation.
- Use clear, easy-to-read fonts, with a minimum of 20 - 22 pt.
These tips will help you to engage your audience and convey your message clearly and effectively at your next scientific conference or event.