Clarifying the Concept and Writing’s Structure of Lay Summary

Popularization of science is seeking ways to help the public to understand the science and scientific findings. 'Lay summary' is one of the key channels for the promotion of science. Lay summaries are short summaries of proposals or research projects that are available for the public, who is not expert in a specific area. This summary should be written in the plain language, avoids using specialized words, and describes any technical terms. This paper aims to study the concept of lay summary, its similarities and differences with similar concepts, and its key indicators. However, the application of this concept in different domains will be investigated and the structure of writing an informative lay summary will be provided. To obtain these purposes, through document analysis method, 34 key references are reviewed and the findings are presente in tables and charts. The similarities and differences among "abstract", "summary", "executive summary", and "lay summary" based on the "audience", "structure," "purpose," and "application" are described. Based on the definitions provided by these references, 17 key indicators that were involved in the compilation of a lay summary, which were categorized in three dimensions: "formal", "content" and "evaluation". Research articles, research projects, research proposals, thesises and academic dissertations were the sources that were introduced in order to produce and disseminate lay summaries' format. Research domains such as medicine, health and health care have become a priority in the preparation and production of lay summaries.