Citizen Science & Social Innovation

Muki Haklay, Extreme Citizen Science groupDepartment of Geography, UCL

Twitter: @mhaklay / @ucl_excites

• What is citizen science?• Bottom-up / top-down. Challenges of multiple

goals.• Why there is an interest in citizen science? (open

science, RRI) • Who is interested (environmental policy, science

policy, innovation)?

Outline

Participatory Mapping: context1980s

• Participatory Rural Appraisal

• Participatory Learning and Action

1990s

• Public Participation GIS (PPGIS)

• Participatory GIS (PGIS)

2000s

• Volunteered / Crowdsourced Geographic information

• Participatory Sensing

2010s

• Citizen Science

APB-CMX Harry Wood 2010

Haklay, Mazumdar & Wardlaw, 2018, Citizen Science for Observing and Understanding the Earth, Earth Observation, Open Science, and Innovation

Citizen Science

Long running Citizen Science

Ecology & biodiversity

Meteorology Archaeology

Citizen Cyberscience

Volunteer computing

Volunteer thinking

Passive Sensing

Community Science

Participatory sensing

DIY Science Civic Science

Citizen Science

Awareness to environmental

or scientific issue

Producing scientific outputs

Achieving temporal and geographical

coverage

Achieving inclusiveness

Increasing scientific literacy

Accessing resources

Creating enjoyable & engaging

experiences

Citizen Science goals

• Each citizen science project is a balancing act between the scientific goals, scale and depth of engagement, benefits to different stakeholders (scientists, participants, project funders)

Participation in citizen science • Collaborative science – problem definition,

data collection and analysisLevel 4 ‘Extreme’

• Participation in problem definition and data collection

Level 3 ‘Participatory science’

• Citizens as basic interpreters Level 2 ‘Distributed intelligence’

• Citizens as sensors Level 1 ‘Crowdsourcing’

Haklay. 2013. Citizen Science and volunteered geographic information: Overview and typology of participation, Crowdsourcing Geographic Knowledge

• Contractual - communities ask professional researchers to conduct a specific scientific investigation and report on the results;

• Contributory - generally designed by scientists and members of the public primarily contribute data;

• Collaborative - generally designed by scientists and members of the public contribute data, refine project design, analyse data, disseminate findings;

• Co-Created - designed by scientists and members of the public working together, some of the public participants are actively involved in most aspects of the research process; and

• Collegial - non-credentialed individuals conduct research independently with varying degrees of expected recognition by institutionalised science.

Shirk et al. 2012 “5 Cs typology”

After Cooper, Dickinson, Phillips & Bonney (2007) Citizen Science as tool for conservation in residential ecosystems. Ecology and Society 12(2)

Question

Study Design

Data Collection

Data Analysis and

Interpretation

Understanding

results

Management Action

Geographic scope

of project

Nature of people

taking action

Research priority

Education priority

Traditional

Science

Scientific

Consulting*Contributory

Citizen

Science

Collaborative

Citizen

Science

Collegial

Citizen

Science /

Participatory

Action

Research

Variable Narrow NarrowBroad Broad

ManagersCommunity

Groups Managers IndividualsCommunity

Groups

Highest Medium High High Medium

Low Medium High High High

*often called Science Shops

Community Science

Co-created

Citizen

Science

Narrow

High

High

All

√

√√√

√

√

√

√

√

√

√ √

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

√ √

√

√

√Public Scientists

√

√

√

Everyone

Passive consumption of science

Opportunistic or highly limited participation

Data collection and analysis

High engagement in DIY science

Joining volunteer computing or thinking

7 Levels of Engagement

Active consumption of science

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 709443

• Participants are well educated & contribution to science is known motivator

• They provide free labour and/or resources, and many want to see outputs used openly

• Open access publications are necessary

• Participants can also analyse the data and might have their own analysis, visualisations and conclusions.

Citizen Science & Open Science

• Open Science and Citizen Science should be jointly considered in research and innovation.

• Pay attention to synergies, international aspects. Ensure support for existing community-driven initiatives.

• Targeted actions are required. Existing systems (funding, rewards, impact assessment and evaluation) need to be assessed and adapted to become fit for CS and OS.

• Education and training is essential. Foster more research, critical reflection and exchange between researchers and practitioners.

• Tools and infrastructures, in particular shared ones for OS and CS, require dedicated support.

DITOs Policy brief

LERU recommendations (2016)

• For Universities: Recognise the field, create a single point of contact, provide ethical and logistical support, ensure long term commitment to participants.

• For Funders: Address range of success criteria, ensure community “pay back”, and open science.

Policy awareness and impact

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21 20

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1514

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12 11

10

98

7

65 4 3

21

One off Long term

Global

National

City

Local

28 29

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23

31

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35 34

R&I

R&I

R&I R&IOutreach

R&I

Outreach/ R&ILT NGO

LT NGO(Method)

SCS

SCS

SCS

SCS

SCS

SCS

SCS SCS SCS

LT GOV

LT GOV LT NGO

LT NGOLT NGOLT NGO

LT NGO

Outreach/ R&IR&IR&I

R&I

Outreach

R&I

MI

MI

MI

MI

Participatory software design

Towards Intelligent Maps

• Open access

• 580 pages • 31 chapters • Case study

on China

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The work of ExCiteS is supported by EPSRC, ERC, EU FP7, EU H2020, RGS, Esri, Forest People Program, Forests Monitor, WRI and all the people in communities that we’ve worked with over the years