As citizen and scientists collaborations grow in popularity, it is important to evaluate these initiatives to determine the degree to which both researchers and the public benefit. Data are available to suggest that citizens can gain a broader understanding of scientific processes and garner a sense of environmental and community efficacy. At the same time, scientists benefit from the increased person-hours on projects that require high numbers of individuals and larger data-sets for analysis. In this talk, I will discuss findings with respect to scientific gain and ecological learning from three distinct citizen science projects.
Results/Conclusions
In particular, the talk will focus on the following three questions and sub-questions. 1. Are citizen scientists effective? An understandable concern among scientists is whether or not citizen-generated data can be used to draw sound conclusions. This leads to the question of whether training and data validation can be reasonable in terms of effort and expense. 2. What does a citizen workforce gain? Often times, scientists seek to establish these programs based on their need for a workforce or datasets that are beyond what is available among professionals. While the benefit to the scientist, in this case is clear, what do the citizens gain? 3. Are participants in these programs to be considered citizen volunteers or scientists? Further, are citizen scientists any scientific lay-person who is engaged in scientific data collection or are these individuals scientific decision-makers? It is possible to define a subset of citizen science programs as those that involve citizens as decision-makers in scientific initiatives outside of formal educational and professional settings? Or further, should the bulk of citizen science initiatives involve citizens solely as technical participants? What, if any, value is there in promoting decision-making among volunteers? I will address these questions in a framework by which ecological literacy can be enhanced through participation in academic science. I will conclude with a broader consideration of citizen sciences as a field and make an argument for unifying individuals who study citizen science in an effort to promote legitimacy in the field.