Citizen science - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Citizen science is a term used for the systematic collection and analysis of data; development of technology; testing of natural phenomena; and the dissemination of these activities by researchers on a primarily avocational basis. Individual citizen science volunteers or networks of volunteers, many of whom may have no specific scientific training, perform or manage research-related tasks such as observation, measurement, or computation.

The use of citizen-science networks often allows scientists to accomplish research objectives more feasibly than would otherwise be possible. In addition, these projects aim to promote public engagement with the research, as well as with science

Science

Science is a systematic enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe...

in general. Some programs provide materials specifically for use by primary or secondary school

Secondary school

Secondary school is a term used to describe an educational institution where the final stage of schooling, known as secondary education and usually compulsory up to a specified age, takes place...

students. As such, citizen science is one approach to informal

Informal education

Informal education is a general term for education outside of a standard school setting. It can refer to various forms of alternative education, such as:* Unschooling or Homeschooling* Autodidacticism * Youth Work...

science education

Science education

Science education is the field concerned with sharing science content and process with individuals not traditionally considered part of the scientific community. The target individuals may be children, college students, or adults within the general public. The field of science education comprises...

. To capture these multiple meanings of citizen science, some workers in the field now refer to "public participation in scientific research."http://caise.insci.org/news/79/51/Public-Participation-in-Scientific-Research/d,resources-page-item-detail

Citizen science is related to long-standing programs employing volunteer monitoring for natural resource management, and is often employed as a form of education and outreach to promote public understanding of science. In recent years, however, citizen science projects are becoming increasingly focused on benefits to the scientific research.

The current form of citizen science, which has evolved over the past two decades, places more emphasis on scientifically sound practices and measurable goals for public education than similar historical efforts. Modern citizen science differs from its historical forms primarily in the access for, and subsequent scale of, public participation; technology is credited as one of the main drivers of the recent explosion of citizen science activity.

Paul Feyerabend

Paul Feyerabend

Paul Karl Feyerabend was an Austrian-born philosopher of science best known for his work as a professor of philosophy at the University of California, Berkeley, where he worked for three decades . He lived a peripatetic life, living at various times in England, the United States, New Zealand,...

(in his book Science in a free society, 1978) and Erwin Chargaff

Erwin Chargaff

Erwin Chargaff was an American biochemist who emigrated to the United States during the Nazi era. Through careful experimentation, Chargaff discovered two rules that helped lead to the discovery of the double helix structure of DNA...

(Heraclitean Fire, 1979) strongly pleaded for a "democratization of science" and "amateurship instead of money-biased technical bureaucrats" respectively. Erwin Chargaff wanted to replace the distorted universitarian science (or better: technology) after 1950 and wanted to go back to the science made by "nature-loving" "amateurs" in the 16th to 18th centuries (for example, Descartes, Newton, Leibniz, Buffon and Darwin).

Examples

The longest-running citizen science project currently active is probably the Audubon Society

National Audubon Society

The National Audubon Society is an American non-profit environmental organization dedicated to conservation. Incorporated in 1905, Audubon is one of the oldest of such organizations in the world and uses science, education and grassroots advocacy to advance its conservation mission...

's Christmas Bird Count

Christmas Bird Count

The Christmas Bird Count is a census of birds in the Western Hemisphere, performed annually in the early Northern-hemisphere winter by volunteer birders...

, which started in 1900. Other examples of citizen science programs include World Water Monitoring Day

World Water Monitoring Day

World Water Monitoring Day is a global educational outreach program that aims to build public awareness and involvement in protecting water resources around the world by empowering citizens to carry out basic monitoring of their local water bodies....

, NASA

NASA

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is the agency of the United States government that is responsible for the nation's civilian space program and for aeronautics and aerospace research...

's Stardust@home

Stardust@home

Stardust@home is a citizen science project that encourages volunteers to search images for tiny interstellar dust impacts. The project began providing data for analysis on August 1, 2006....

and Clickworkers

Clickworkers

ClickWorkers is a small NASA experimental project that uses public volunteers for scientific tasks that require human perception and common sense, but not a lot of scientific training...

, a variety of projects run by the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology

Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology

The Cornell Lab of Ornithology is a member-supported unit of Cornell University in Ithaca, New York which studies birds and other wildlife. It is housed in the Imogene Powers Johnson Center for Birds and Biodiversity in Sapsucker Woods Sanctuary...

, such as eBird

EBird

eBird is an on-line database of bird observations providing scientists, researchers and amateur naturalists with real-time data about bird distribution and abundance. Originally restricted to sightings from the Western Hemisphere, it was widened to include New Zealand in 2008, and was widened to...

, NestWatch, Project FeederWatch, the Whale Shark Photo-identification Library, and Celebrate Urban Birds, Zooniverse

Zooniverse (citizen science project)

Zooniverse is a citizen science web portal that grew from the original Galaxy Zoo project. It hosts numerous projects which allow users to participate in scientific research from classifying galaxies to collating climate data...

including the Galaxy Zoo

Galaxy Zoo

Galaxy Zoo is an online astronomy project which invites members of the public to assist in the morphological classification of large numbers of galaxies. It is an example of citizen science as it enlists the help of members of the public to help in scientific research. An improved version—Galaxy...

project, Foldit

Foldit

Foldit is an online puzzle video game about protein folding. The game is part of an experimental research project, and is developed by the University of Washington's Center for Game Science in collaboration with the UW Department of Biochemistry...

and the Phylo video game. Another example of an effective citizen science project in the United States is the Community Collaborative Rain, Hail & Snow Network (CoCoRaHS), run by the Colorado Climate Center at the Colorado State University in Fort Collins, Colorado. Data from this project is used for weather forecasting and monitoring, severe weather alerts, and climate studies. National Geographic has an archeology project, Field Expedition: Mongolia, in which users tag potential archeological dig sites on GeoEye satellite images, to assist explorers on the ground in Mongolia.

Citizen science networks are extensively involved in phenology

Phenology

Phenology is the study of periodic plant and animal life cycle events and how these are influenced by seasonal and interannual variations in climate...

, the observation of cyclic events of nature, in order to investigate how global warming affects plant and animal life in different geographic areas. Distributed computing

Distributed computing

Distributed computing is a field of computer science that studies distributed systems. A distributed system consists of multiple autonomous computers that communicate through a computer network. The computers interact with each other in order to achieve a common goal...

ventures such as SETI@home

SETI@home

SETI@home is an Internet-based public volunteer computing project employing the BOINC software platform, hosted by the Space Sciences Laboratory, at the University of California, Berkeley, in the United States. SETI is an acronym for the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence...

may also be considered citizen science, even though the primary task of computation is performed by volunteers' computers.

The increasing prevalence and use of consumer electronic devices that can record media, such as mobile phones, has allowed for easier citizen data collection about the condition of public spaces, such as public parks as seen in the ParkScan website developed by the San Francisco Neighborhood Parks Council and bird sightings collected using the WildLab http://www.thewildlab.org iPhone app.

The growing DIYbio

DIYbio

Founded by Mackenzie Cowell and Jason Bobe, DIYbio is a network of individuals from around the globe that aims to help make biology a worthwhile pursuit for citizen scientists, amateur biologists, and do-it-yourself biological engineers who value openness and safety...

and biopunk

Biopunk

Biopunk is a term used to describe:# A hobbyist who experiments with DNA and other aspects of genetics.# A technoprogressive movement advocating open access to genetic information....

movements are a form of citizen science, as are amateur radio

Amateur radio

Amateur radio is the use of designated radio frequency spectrum for purposes of private recreation, non-commercial exchange of messages, wireless experimentation, self-training, and emergency communication...

, amateur astronomy

Amateur astronomy

Amateur astronomy, also called backyard astronomy and stargazing, is a hobby whose participants enjoy watching the night sky , and the plethora of objects found in it, mainly with portable telescopes and binoculars...

, and Maker

Make (magazine)

Make is an American quarterly magazine published by O'Reilly Media which focuses on do it yourself and/or DIWO projects involving computers, electronics, robotics, metalworking, woodworking and other disciplines...

activities.

Other uses of the term

Bruce Lewenstein of Cornell University

Cornell University

Cornell University is an Ivy League university located in Ithaca, New York, United States. It is a private land-grant university, receiving annual funding from the State of New York for certain educational missions...

's Communication

Communication studies

Communication Studies is an academic field that deals with processes of communication, commonly defined as the sharing of symbols over distances in space and time. Hence, communication studies encompasses a wide range of topics and contexts ranging from face-to-face conversation to speeches to mass...

and S&TS

Science and technology studies

Science, technology and society is the study of how social, political, and cultural values affect scientific research and technological innovation, and how these, in turn, affect society, politics and culture...

departments points out two additional usages of the terms "citizen science" and "citizen scientist":
Among the scientists and science studies scholars who have referred to these other ideas are Frank Von Hippel, Steve Schneider, Neal Lane, Jon Beckwith, and Alan Irwin. Alternate terminology proposed for these usages are "civic science" and "civic scientist."

Distinction from crowdsourcing

The distinction made between crowdsourcing

Crowdsourcing

Crowdsourcing is the act of sourcing tasks traditionally performed by specific individuals to a group of people or community through an open call....

and citizen science is, according to Yale-based astrophysicist and Galaxy Zoo founder Kevin Schawinski,http://www.wikinomics.com/blog/index.php/2009/02/09/crowdsourcing-versus-citizen-science/

"We prefer to call this Galaxy Zoo

Galaxy Zoo

citizen science because it’s a better description of what you’re doing; you’re a regular citizen but you’re doing science. Crowd sourcing sounds a bit like, well, you’re just a member of the crowd and you’re not; you’re our collaborator. You’re pro-actively involved in the process of science by participating."

On comparisons between Galaxy Zoo and SETI@home:

"Galaxy Zoo volunteers do real work. They’re not just passively running something on their computer and hoping that they’ll be the first person to find aliens. They have a stake in science that comes out of it, which means that they are now interested in what we do with it, and what we find."

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.