Marine Citizen Science: Recent Developments and Future Recommendations

Andrew Sandahl,Anders P. Tøttrup

doi:10.5334/cstp.270

Abstract

Marine Citizen Science (MCS) is highly underrepresented in the citizen science literature, despite the instrumental (data-focused) and capacity-building (society-focused) benefits such projects offer for marine conservation. Nevertheless, the MCS literature has experienced continual growth since its first publications in the early 1990s. Few reviews have considered the developing history of MCS, and none have considered recent developments in the field. By reviewing 185 MCS papers published from 2014–2018, this study examines recent developments in MCS and offers informed recommendations for future MCS projects. Over the five surveyed years, there were significant increasing trends in both MCS publication quantity and diversity of affiliated research countries, although many tropical study regions with high observation potential remained underrepresented. Sixty-eight percent (68%, N = 126) of surveyed MCS studies focused on non-emblematic study subjects versus thirty-two percent (32%, N = 59) of studies that focused on emblematic subjects (e.g., coral reefs, megafauna, and endangered/critically endangered species found on the Red List of Threatened Species compiled by the International Union for Conservation of Nature [IUCN]), suggesting that the charismatic appeal of the scientific topic may not be a limiting factor to volunteer participation. Nearly 82% (N = 151) of studies failed to describe explicit hypotheses, and many studies utilizing novel data neglected to include descriptions of data quality assurance measures (25%, N = 47) in their reports, potentially fueling the credibility challenge, which citizen science research faces as a whole. Finally, only a small portion of studies (10%, N = 19) involved participants beyond mere data collection, despite the unique and diverse perspectives volunteers may bring to scientific research. Collectively, these results aid in forming a set of recommendations for future MCS projects seeking to improve the quality of their credibility, study design, and volunteer contributions through explicitly stating hypotheses/quality-insurance methods, considering the potential of non-emblematic study species/smartphone applications, and designing projects that allow for a spectrum of volunteer participation in high-observation potential areas.

Highlights

Introduction and ObjectivesSince citizen science was first mentioned in 1989 (Haklay 2015), the field has experienced a steady increase in popularity, in the field of ecology (Follett and Strezov 2015)
Searches were conducted in Web of Science, Scopus, and Google Scholar databases between January and February 2019, using the topical search terms “marine citizen science,” “ocean citizen science,” “coastal citizen science,” and “marine volunteer” individually
Trends in quantity and researcher/research locations of published marine citizen science (MCS) studies A total of 185 studies were retained in our literature survey of MCS studies published from 2014 to 2018

Summary

Introduction

Introduction and ObjectivesSince citizen science was first mentioned in 1989 (Haklay 2015), the field has experienced a steady increase in popularity, in the field of ecology (Follett and Strezov 2015). In addition to fulfilling these labor-focused, instrumental goals, citizen science addresses socially focused, capacity-building goals by inspiring, educating, and engaging members of the public in scientific issues (Ceccaroni et al 2017). Ment or other institutions to manage natural resources, through building marine citizenship and ocean literacy among volunteers (Kelly et al 2019) To accomplish these instrumental and capacity-building goals, citizen science projects involve volunteers in one or more steps in the scientific process (Shirk et al 2012), contributory projects, in which volunteers act primarily as data collectors, tend to be most common. Less common are collaborative projects (projects in which volunteers participate beyond data collection) and co-created projects (projects which are jointly developed and executed, and results are reported by scientists and members of the public) (Shirk et al 2012)

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Conclusion