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"Significant changes." "Substantial impacts." "Considerable variation." These phrases show up constantly in ocean communication, and they're almost always less useful than they seem. Image: A fisher in seagrass (Bali). Credit: Ben Jones / Ocean Image Bank

1/9/26, 3:51 pm1 repost0 likes

Sam Andrews

@oceanoculus.com

1 Sept

Vague language feels like it's making data more accessible. What it's actually doing is obscuring it. "A 40% decline in seagrass cover over twenty years" is clearer, more honest, and harder to misinterpret than "significant losses of seagrass habitat."

Sam Andrews

@oceanoculus.com

1 Sept

There's also a trust dimension. Audiences, especially policymakers and journalists, notice when numbers go missing from findings that clearly had numbers. Specificity signals confidence. Vagueness can signal the opposite.