Citizen science in environmental and ecological sciences

Abstract

Citizen science, broadly defined as public participation in scientific research and knowledge production, is becoming an increasingly well developed and valued approach with global reach and used in a wide range of scientific domains [1][2][3] . Much of this growth is driven by the availability of information technology infrastructures such as mobile phones and low-cost sensors for gathering and reporting data, the internet for sharing data, and cloud storage for hosting and storing data 4,5 . Growing literacy levels and educational attainment in many parts of the world also make it possible for many more people to contribute to knowledge creation in a meaningful way 6,7 .Citizen science initiatives involve the public in the research process to generate genuine scientific outcomes [8][9][10][11] . These outcomes include discoveries, such as in astrophysics 12 and archaeology projects 13 ; new insights, such as in epidemiology 14 and socio-linguistics projects 15 ; evidence-based policymaking, such as in pollution-monitoring initiatives [16][17][18] ; interventions such as in public health research 19 ; and environmental governance, including in ecology and biodiversity monitoring initiatives [20][21][22] . Citizen science research can fill important data gaps across both time and space 23 , which might not otherwise be possible without the contribution of many participants, including people with local and lay knowledge 24,25 or Indigenous knowledge 26,27 .

Monitoring population change using ’citizen science’ data: case study of the Hungarian White Stork(Ciconia ciconia)population between 1999 and 2021

“…Large datasets collected by volunteers are generally suitable for carrying out scientific research (Fraisl et al 2002). There are good examples of large and/or long scale bird studies involving volunteers, such as the more than hundred years old Christmas Bird Count (Bock & Root 1981), or the continent-wide mapping activities of the European Bird Atlas 2 (Chokiewicz & Sikora 2020).…”

Citizen Science and Monitoring Forest Pests: a Beneficial Alliance?

“…Species identification is only one component of data quality. Some critics express concern that citizen science data are of low quality [97], but there is a range of ways of ensuring data from citizen science are of good quality [98][99][100]. Different types of citizen science data can be collected, e.g.…”

Citizen Science for One Digital Health: A Rapid Qualitative Review of Studies in Air Quality with Reflections on a Conceptual Model

“…Broadly speaking, citizen science involves active forms of public participation in scientific knowledge production (Heigl et al 2019;Haklay et al 2021). It can facilitate environmental education and citizenship (Jorgensen and Jorgensen 2021), including climate justice, mitigation, and adaptation (Ceccaroni et al 2020;Fraisl et al 2022).…”

“…The aim of this paper is to highlight practices and possibilities of citizen science for accelerating the adoption, and realizing the value, of One Digital Health. This paper focuses on air quality because it is a cross-cutting concern in One Health and critically illustrates digitally enabled citizen science addressing climate change adaptation (EEA 2019;Fraisl et al 2022;McCarron et al 2022).…”