by Mark Mags, Pixabay licence (https://bit.ly/3yfagIF)

What is citizen science?

In very simplified terms, in citizen science, scientific projects are carried out with the assistance or completely by interested amateurs [lat. amator "lover"]. The Citizen Scientists formulate research questions, report observations, carry out measurements, evaluate data and/or write publications. Compliance with scientific criteria is a prerequisite. Projects are carried out in all areas of research, from the natural sciences, humanities and social sciences to the arts and cultural studies. This not only makes new scientific projects and new findings possible, but also enables a dialogue between science and society that is otherwise impossible or very difficult.

More precisely, citizen science is not yet uniformly defined at present. This was already evident in the mid-1990s, when Alan Irwin (UK) and Rick Bonney (USA) independently used this term and each coined it for themselves.

In Alan Irwin's view, citizen science means the development of a knowledge society in which science and research policy open up towards society. Irwin wanted to state that science should not be indifferent to the needs of society, and that citizens themselves can also do sound science.

Rick Bonney defined citizen science as the participation of amateurs in scientific projects for the purpose of data collection (crowdsourcing).

These two currents are still present today. A 2017 research article tries to map the global discussion on the definition of citizen science. We have written a blog entry on this here. There was also a discussion about the definition of citizen science itself, which, based on an article from Austria, led to an in-depth international investigation into the diversity of citizen science.

Since this discussion is very broad and will certainly continue for some time, we have set up the working group for quality criteria for the Österreich forscht platform, which has developed criteria that can be viewed on the working group's page. The criteria developed ensure and increase the quality of the citizen science projects on the platform on the one hand and on the other hand offer citizens the certainty that all projects listed on Österreich forscht are carried out according to objective and comprehensible quality criteria.

At the end of this post, we offer a short overview of different concepts in Austria with a video series that was produced during the Austrian Citizen Science Conference 2017. In the following you will find different forms of participation in citizen science projects according to Muki Haklay and the White Paper on Citizen Science by Sanz and colleagues.

By which principles are citizen science projects characterised?

According to the White Paper on Citizen Science in Europe

In contrast to the above-mentioned classification by Haklay (2013), the white paper that emerged from the "Socientize" project distinguishes between several equally valid forms of participation by amateurs in scientific projects. In the field of Collective Intelligence, the main focus is on pattern recognition. The Zooniverse projects mentioned above fall under this category.

Pooling of resources is mainly about interested people making resources available, such as unused computing power from their smartphones or computers. This is then used to carry out complicated computing processes distributed over thousands of devices in a short time. Here again, the seti@home project mentioned above should be mentioned.

In Data Collection projects, amateurs collect data and make it available to the project leaders in various forms. Good examples from Austria for projects in this category would be the StadtWildTiere project or ornitho.at. This is currently one of the most widespread methods of participation.

In the Analysis Task, amateurs are involved to varying degrees, especially in the analysis, i. e. the evaluation of the data. The City Country Child project, for example, analysed and interpreted images of longing for the countryside at the Volkskundemuseum Wien together with the citizen scientists in intergenerational image discussions and photo expeditions

In the field of serious games, there has been a great development in recent years. In this concept, also known as Gamification, the participants contribute to the scientific projects by actively playing, which usually consists of solving tricky problems or recognising patterns. On the one hand, better algorithms can be developed by analysing the solution paths, on the other hand, data can also be collected directly in this way. A well-known international example of such projects would be Fotoquest Go, in which participants were sent to specific locations throughout Austria to document land use at these locations, just like in Pokemon Go.

In Participatory Experiments, the participants are already involved in the development of the research question and in further project phases. Often these projects are locally limited or aimed at clearly defined target groups. In the Roadkill project, for example, citizens are involved throughout the course of the project, i.e. they can help define research questions, collect and interpret data, carry out analyses themselves and also co-author publications.

Grassroots activities are mainly found in the DIY (Do It Yourself) movement. They are often carried out by communities or associations, often have a social component and can also be carried out entirely by amateurs. The Safecast project from Japan has caused a stir internationally in this field.

As according to Muki Haklay (2013)

Here, several levels of participation in professional science by so-called amateurs are usually distinguished. In contrast to the previous categorisation according to the White Paper on Citizen Science, the different levels create a sometimes unintentional hierarchy and thus a ranking of the forms of participation.

The simplest form of participation is found on level 1, "crowdsourcing", where citizens wear sensors that send data to professional scientists or they simply make the computing power of their computers or smartphones available. The participants in such projects do not have to perform any cognitive work. One example of this is seti@home.

At level 2, "distributed intelligence", participants are challenged more. Here, participants are confronted with simple tasks that computers are not yet able to carry out and would therefore take up a lot of time if scientists had to do them alone, such as analysing photos from photo traps. Projects that fall into this category are, for example, the projects on Zooniverse.

Level 3 "Participatory science" means the involvement of the population already in the development of the question or problem and/or the collection of data. Amateur*s perceive environmental changes in their environment very quickly and can pass this data on to scientists through citizen science projects, where it is processed and published accordingly, or passed on to responsible authorities after analysis and interpretation. Thus, cooperation in a citizen science project can contribute to a quick solution of a problem or to the efficient recognition of a change in the public. Examples would be identifying animal or plant species (Roadkill project, naturbeobachtung.at), doing genealogy (GenTeam) or contributing to historical research (Topotheque).

Level 4 is called "extreme citizen science", as amateurs are involved in all steps from problem definition to data collection and analysis. Examples are few, but can be found mainly in astronomy or ornithology, as these fields have a long tradition of citizen science.

History of Citizen Science

Citizen science is often interpreted as a return of professional science to its roots, since science was initially done by amateurs and only later became academicised and institutionalised at universities. Under the term citizen science, amateurs are now "allowed" to do science again - "back to the roots", so to speak (Silvertown 2009; Finke 2014; Bonney et al. 2014). It should be pointed out that scientific research was only integrated into universities in the second half of the 19th century through the Humboldtian ideal of education, but until then people without a higher level of education were only able to do science, let alone publish results, in the most exceptional cases. No farmer or craftsman had the time and money to devote to science. In connection with citizen science, Charles Darwin is often described as the best-known amateur who did science (e.g. Silvertown, 2009). Darwin also attended lectures on botany, zoology and geology out of interest as part of his medical and later theological studies. When Darwin embarked on his famous voyage on HMS Beagle, he was employed as a scientifically trained companion, although formally he was actually a theologian (Engels 2007). Thus Darwin can be described as an amateur with extensive biological knowledge.

It is only through the combination of citizen science, Web 2.0 and the open access movement that it is now possible for significantly more people to participate in science than the extremely privileged few in Darwin's time; they collect, analyse and even publish on their own (e. g. Kalheber 2003).

Austria also has a long tradition of cooperation between science and the general public. In the book ‘Populäres Wissen - Von der Laienforschung des 19. Jahrhunderts zur heutigen Citizen Science - eine Annäherung’ (2023), 29 authors from a wide range of Austrian institutions, including associations, universities, public authorities and museums, have worked through the history of citizen science in Austria from the 19th century to the present day on the initiative of Österreich forscht and under the guidance of the editor Dr Christian Stifter. Since this history of ‘lay research’ in Austria is so incredibly diverse, the 17 chapters can only be an approximation. There is also a short review on Österreich forscht.

Series of interviews on citizen science in Austria

The following videos were created during the 2017 Austrian citizen science conference. Although these videos are already several years old, they still provide a good first insight into Citizen Science. All videos are in German.