Modality Overview: Why Research Posters?

Research Posters are a well-defined genre for sharing the results of a study, most typically at a conference where researchers are discussing their work with others. These posters are both a visual aid for a live verbal conversation but also an artifact to leave behind to summarize a full-length report.

The Research Poster genre continues to be most widely used in the sciences, which is why the remixable template in this module is organized according to the logic of the scientific method and lab reports with a familiar, well-established structure from introduction to results to conclusion. Other disciplines and methodologies beyond the sciences use Research Posters for similar purposes, which means that they are likely to use different headings, sections, and structures. When formatting a Research Poster, you should follow any provided guidelines for format and structure, but even scientists at the same conference will organize their posters differently—so there is room for creativity.

In many cases, especially with scientific Research Posters, the data and results are most important, which is why the Remixable Template gives twice as much space to that section. Data visualization is an essential part of most Research Posters, and the Infographic Module complements this project. You might include a number of infographics in your research poster. You can also think of a Research Poster as a specific, large-format type of “infographic” itself.

Research Posters have a deliberate, modular structure for a reason: researchers often want to read or discuss one or two particular segments of the poster—and often not in order from beginning to end. They are designed to be bite-sized encapsulations of a full-length report to enable a live dialogue among researchers initially but then to eventually encourage a deeper dive into the full report and additional research.