Is there anybody out there?: On readership

Think of face-to-face oral communication: Do you address your friends, fellow researchers, relatives using the same words, the same register? Chances are you have just given a negative answer to this question. And the reasons are quite transparent: they represent different kinds of audiences, so you probably tune in your discourse to meet the expectations of your fellow speakers. You quite possibly believe that your audiences deserve to be presented with a message encoded in a way that allows them to understand, relate and respond to your utterances, basically so that a dialogue can be established. In much simpler words, you adapt your contributions to conversation so they rise to the expectations of your interlocutors.
It is frequently the case, when we engage in scientific writing, that we overlook the characteristics of our potential readers. In fact, it is likely that experienced academic authors have never thought of the people who might be actually be reading their texts. We usually assume that our papers will be read by fellow researchers because the scientific entourage is a tiny world after all.
Nonetheless, constructing the figure of an intended reader is one essential aspect in the writing process. Come to think of it, an academic piece of writing is likely to have several different audiences, each focusing on different aspects of the text, each approaching the text with different expectations.
Consider the path that a paper to be printed in an academic journal is set to follow. The first set of readers is the journal’s editorial team. They focus on form: bibliographical data, citations, footnoting, layout. Once this group of readers expresses their conformity, the paper reaches blind peer editors, whose focus will lie on content. When the paper is finally printed, its destination gets blurrier: it may be read by other scientists, students, lay people. The possibilities are not infinite, but they are, indeed, diverse. And you will need to make an impression on them if you wish your research to transcend the printed page.
Pleasing this wide variety of readers is a seemingly impossible task. However, it is fundamental that, before we start writing the text, we picture, as accurately as possible, who our intended audience is . Once the picture is clear, wording the paper is only a matter of meeting their expectations, of opening up paths for discussion and research threads that can be given some sort of continuity.
Ignoring this key element in scientific communication would be very much like rolling up a message into a bottle and letting it float adrift. If we get lucky, it will reach the shore. If we are even more fortunate, someone will find the bottle, pop it open and see the message. Pushing our luck, the message will be read, but it would take, virtually, a miracle for the message to be fully understood.
Get your searchlights ready, then, and start looking for these potential –and never ideal or idealized- readers. They are certainly out there.