Narrative review of citizen science in environmental epidemiology: Setting the stage for co-created research projects in environmental epidemiology

Co-creating a local environmental epidemiology study: the case of citizen science for investigating air pollution and related health risks in Barcelona, Spain

“…The Bristol Approach proposes a model of co-creation that builds on the principles of participatory action research, people-centered innovation and the common goods. In a recent narrative review, we adapted this model from a general perspective and developed a four-phase framework with features that occur in different participatory practices in environmental health research: (1) identification (civic concerns are identified and translated into a research question), (2) design (data collection tools, data governance and other aspects of the study protocol are defined), (3) the deployment (data are collected and analyzed) and (4) action (results are transformed into practical citizen-produced knowledge to inform public policies) [ 11 ]. This framework closely resembles to other participatory research frameworks and guidelines that have been already defined by environmental health researchers [ 5 , 12 , 13 ].…”

“…This framework closely resembles to other participatory research frameworks and guidelines that have been already defined by environmental health researchers [ 5 , 12 , 13 ]. In comparison to the other frameworks, this four-phase framework stresses the importance of involving the citizens in each phase of the research process, that is the citizens having an active role in the scientific governance, and calls for an equal involvement between experts and citizens when it comes to decision-making [ 11 ].…”

“…Over the last few years, although there have been several initiatives claiming to apply a citizen science approach to measure air quality parameters [ 14 , 15 ], participatory research projects on air quality are not new and exist since more than two decades [ 16 – 18 ]. While such initiatives are driven by health-related concerns, those research projects for the study of air pollution using citizen science or other participatory approaches do not often focus specifically on assessing the link between air pollution and health [ 7 , 11 ]. The research study of Wing et al [ 6 ] is a good example of an environmental epidemiology study in which citizens were involved in almost all the research process and collaborated with researchers to investigate the relationship between exposure to air pollution from industrial swine production and several health endpoints, including lung function, blood pressure, mood and stress level.…”

Methods of Promoting Learning and Data Quality in Citizen and Community Science

“…Community inquiry can raise awareness, drive behavior change and support transitions toward more sustainable ways of living in areas such as public health and environmental conversation (Sauermann et al, 2020). It can enhance the sustainability of research projects and democratize science, especially when communities are invited to take part in all stages of the scientific research, projects are locally relevant and are addressing both the social and technical aspects of sustainability, and by eliminating tensions between traditional science and CS (Sauermann et al, 2020;Froeling et al, 2021).The significance of developing community inquiry though participation in CS activities comes with a major challenge, that of producing high quality datasets that can be used to inform future research and policy initiatives (Kosmala et al, 2016;Parrish et al, 2018). Citizens are often not trained, or do not have the skills, to conduct scientific activities and thus their involvement is often faced with skepticism.…”

Citizen-driven participatory research conducted through knowledge intermediary units. A thematic synthesis of the literature on “Science Shops”

“…The roots of crowd science lie in biology, conservation, and ecology where citizen collaboration was sought to collect and classify data. But the methods have now been taken up in other fields, including the social sciences and epidemiology where public participation is sought in projects related to environmental issues and health [Kullenberg and Kasperowski, 2016;Froeling et al, 2021]. Crowd or citizen science clearly illustrates how scientific research benefits from ICT tools which facilitate the broad involvement of different actors.…”