Participation In Citizen Science Projects Research Articles

What are the prospects for citizen science in agriculture? Evidence from three continents on motivation and mobile telephone use of resource-poor farmers.

As the sustainability of agricultural citizen science projects depends on volunteer farmers who contribute their time, energy and skills, understanding their motivation is important to attract and retain participants in citizen science projects. The objectives of this study were to assess 1) farmers’ motivations to participate as citizen scientists and 2) farmers’ mobile telephone usage. Building on motivational factors identified from previous citizen science studies, a questionnaire based methodology was developed which allowed the analysis of motivational factors and their relation to farmers’ characteristics. The questionnaire was applied in three communities of farmers, in countries from different continents, participating as citizen scientists. We used statistical tests to compare motivational factors within and among the three countries. In addition, the relations between motivational factors and farmers characteristics were assessed. Lastly, Principal Component Analysis (PCA) was used to group farmers based on their motivations. Although there was an overlap between the types of motivations, for Indian farmers a collectivistic type of motivation (i.e., contribute to scientific research) was more important than egoistic and altruistic motivations. For Ethiopian and Honduran farmers an egoistic intrinsic type of motivation (i.e., interest in sharing information) was most important. While fun has appeared to be an important egoistic intrinsic factor to participate in other citizen science projects, the smallholder farmers involved in this research valued ‘passing free time’ the lowest. Two major groups of farmers were distinguished: one motivated by sharing information (egoistic intrinsic), helping (altruism) and contribute to scientific research (collectivistic) and one motivated by egoistic extrinsic factors (expectation, expert interaction and community interaction). Country and education level were the two most important farmers’ characteristics that explain around 20% of the variation in farmers motivations. For educated farmers, contributing to scientific research was a more important motivation to participate as citizen scientists compared to less educated farmers. We conclude that motivations to participate in citizen science are different for smallholders in agriculture compared to other sectors. Citizen science does have high potential, but easy to use mechanisms are needed. Moreover, gamification may increase the egoistic intrinsic motivation of farmers.

The Economy of Shark Conservation in the Northeast Pacific: The Role of Ecotourism and Citizen Science.

Historically sharks have been seen either as a source of income through harvesting, or as a nuisance and danger. The economic value of sharks has traditionally been measured as the total value of sharks caught for liver oil, fins, or meat for consumption. Sharks have also been killed to near extinction in cases where they were seen as a threat to fisheries on other species. This is illustrated by the mass extermination of Basking Sharks (Cetorhinus maximus) in British Columbia. They were seen as a nuisance to fishermen as they got entangled in gill nets during the salmon fishing season. However with the development of the SCUBA diving industry, and ecotourism in general, increased awareness of the role sharks play in marine ecosystems has resulted in changes in how they are perceived and utilized. Despite an ongoing harvest of sharks such as the North Pacific Spiny Dogfish (Squalus suckleyi), sharks now generate economic value through SCUBA diving enthusiasts who travel the globe to see, swim with, and photograph them. The use of digital cameras and other digital media has brought sharks into households around the world and increased awareness of the conservation issues facing many species. This renewed appreciation has led to a better understanding of sharks by the public, resulting in advocates calling for better protections and conservation. In particular, a growing part of the SCUBA diving community wants to contribute to conservation and research projects, which has led to participation in citizen science projects. These projects provide scientific data but also gain ground as ecotourism activities, thus adding to both economic value of tourism and conservation efforts.

Mapping epistemic cultures and learning potential of participants in citizen science projects.

The ever-widening scope and range of global change and interconnected systemic risks arising from people-environment relationships (social-ecological risks) appears to be increasing concern among, and involvement of, citizens in an increasingly diversified number of citizen science projects responding to these risks. We examined the relationship between epistemic cultures in citizen science projects and learning potential related to matters of concern. We then developed a typology of purposes and a citizen science epistemic-cultures heuristic and mapped 56 projects in southern Africa using this framework. The purpose typology represents the range of knowledge-production purposes, ranging from laboratory science to social learning, whereas the epistemic-cultures typology is a relational representation of scientist and citizen participation and their approach to knowledge production. Results showed an iterative relationship between matters of fact and matters of concern across the projects; the nexus of citizens' engagement in knowledge-production activities varied. The knowledge-production purposes informed and shaped the epistemic cultures of all the sampled citizen science projects, which in turn influenced the potential for learning within each project. Through a historical review of 3 phases in a long-term river health-monitoring project, we found that it is possible to evolve the learning curve of citizen science projects. This evolution involved the development of scientific water monitoring tools, the parallel development of pedagogic practices supporting monitoring activities, and situated engagement around matters of concern within social activism leading to learning-led change. We conclude that such evolutionary processes serve to increase potential for learning and are necessary if citizen science is to contribute to wider restructuring of the epistemic culture of science under conditions of expanding social-ecological risk.

Supporting emerging forms of citizen science: a plea for diversity, creativity and social innovation

In recent years, citizen science has gained popularity not only in the scientific community but also with the general public. The potential it projects in fostering an open and participatory approach to science, decreasing the distance between science and society, and contributing to the wider goal of an inclusive society is being explored by scientists, science communicators, educators, policy makers and related stakeholders. The public's participation in citizen science projects is still often reduced to data gathering and data manipulation such as classification of data. However, the citizen science landscape is much broader and diverse, inter alia due to the participation opportunities offered by latest ICT. The emergence of new forms of collaboration and grassroots initiatives is currently being experienced. In an open consultation process that led to the "White Paper on Citizen Science for Europe", the support of a wide range of project types and innovative forms of participation in science was requested. In this paper we argue for mechanisms that encourage a variety of approaches, promote emerging and creative concepts and widen the perspectives for social innovation.

Volunteer participation in citizen science projects

The purpose of this research is to assess the current state of citizen science projects and reveal the role of volunteers in the research process. This is achieved by performing a literature review and content analysis of three international and one state-owned citizen science platforms (Wikipedia, SciStarter, CitSci and Precipita) that contain more than 800 research projects. Projects have been analyzed according to four categories: the academic disciplines, the way the project is designed, the phases of the research in which volunteers participate, and the tasks they perform. The results show that projects in the arts, humanities, and social sciences disciplines are almost non-existent. In addition, in the field of natural and physical sciences, projects are fostered with a top-down approach and volunteers participate primarily in the data collection phase in order to obtain a large volume of data, thereby receiving more financing from the European Union.

Changes in participants' scientific attitudes and epistemological beliefs during an astronomical citizen science project

AbstractCitizen science projects provide non‐scientists with opportunities to take part in scientific research. While their contribution to scientific data collection has been well documented, there is limited research on how participation in citizen science projects may affect their scientific literacy. In this study, we investigated (1) how volunteers' attitudes towards science and epistemological beliefs about the nature of science changed after six months of participation in an astronomy‐themed citizen science project and (2) how the level of project participation related to these changes. Two main instruments were used to measure participants' scientific attitude and epistemological beliefs and were administered before they registered for the program and six months after their registration. For analysis, we used pre‐ and post‐test data collected from 333 participants who responded to both tests. Among them, nine participants were randomly chosen for interviews. Participants' responses were analyzed using the Rasch Rating Scale Model. Results show that overall scientific attitudes changed positively, p < 0.01. The change was strongest in attitudes towards science news and citizen science projects. The scientific attitudinal change was related to participant social activity in the project. There was a negative change in their evaluation of their knowledge. The interviews suggest that this is due to a greater appreciation for what they have yet to learn. Epistemological beliefs about the nature of science significantly improved from the pre‐ to the post‐tests, p < 0.05. Overall, we found volunteers' participation in social components of the program was significantly related to their improvement in scientific literacy while other project participation variables (such as amount of data contributed to the project) was not. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 50: 773–801, 2013

Using citizen science beyond teaching science content: a strategy for making science relevant to students’ lives

I respond to Pike and Dunne by exploring the utilization of citizen science in science education. Their results indicate that students fail to pursue science beyond the secondary level, in part, because of prior educational experiences with science education. Students lack motivation to pursue degrees and careers in science because they feel science is not relevant to their lives or they are simply not good at science. With this understanding, the science education community now needs to move beyond a discussion of the problem and move forward with continued discourse on possible solutions. Science educators need to focus on developing connections between students’ everyday lives and science so that they will have tangible reasons for continuing with the lifelong learning of science. In this response, I will show that citizen science as an educational context holds much promise, respectively. Participation in citizen science projects moves scientific content from the abstract to the tangible involving students in hands-on, active learning. In addition, if civic projects are centered within their own communities, then the science becomes relevant to their lives because it is focused on topics in their own backyards.