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Ci#zen Science: Science as a Team Sport Julia K. Parrish College of the Environment, Univ. Washington [email protected]

Property of COASST, please do not use without permission

Informal Science

informa@on collected not

samples data

verifiable not

task educa@on & awareness

Ci0zen Science Ci0zen Engagement

Rigorous Ci0zen Science

not independent inquiry Personalized Ci0zen Science

deduc@ve Crowd Sourcing

Crowd Sourcing


•  measure and map precip (rain, hail, snow) •  started in 1998 •  20,000 participants •  dataset used to ground-truth, measure fine-scale

Community Collabora#ve Rain, Hail & Snow Network


Galaxy Zoo

Volunteers sort through images of galaxies taken from the Hubble telescope and classify them based on shape.

•  >250,000 par@cipants •  World's largest database of galaxy

shapes. •  Each photo inspected by mul@ple par@cipants to calculate confidence


Plankton Portal – Crowd Sourcing Iden@fica@on and Measurement


1

10

100

1000

10000

100000

1000000

1 10 100 1000

Theobald, E<nger, et al. Biol. Cons. 2015

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10

100

1000

10000

100000

1000000

1 10 100 1000 10000 100000 Spa@al Extent (“up to” km bins) Longevity (years) Cu

rren

t Par@cipants (v

alue or m

edian)

Ci#zen Science Scales of Par#cipa#on

25+ years fine grain, broad extent


Coastal Observation and Seabird Survey Team


•  16 years •  2,500 people trained •  850 current par@cipants •  520 sites from Mendocino to Kotzebue •  50,000 carcasses found •  167 species

We Are...

as of November 2014 Property of COASST, please do not use without permission

type foot 1

bill:‘hairline’ to Pp of bill

wing: wrist to Pp of longest primary

foot: ankle joint to knuckles

2 take 3 measurements

3 photograph w/ scale & plumage characters


par@cipants collect data

par@cipants enter data online

COASST verifies ALL data

www.coasst.org COASST Reports special projects &

data requests

early warning for avian influenza (w/ WDFW)

remote community involvement (w/ AK Sea Grant) western grebe popula@on gene@cs (w/ PRBO ConservaPon Science)

oil spill baseline (w/ NOAA)

fishery bycatch baseline in the Salish Sea (w/ WDFW, CWS)

harmful algal blooms (w/ OCNMS, UCSC, USGS)

effects of climate (w/ BeachCOMBERS, JISAO, NOAA)

entanglement rates (w/ GFNMS, BeachCOMBERS)

public, scien@fic, and academic talks

in-‐community COASST training in-‐community COASST refreshers

in-‐community COASST socials phone, email, facebook interac@on w/ COASST view and/or download from www.coasst.org

par@cipants (e)mail datasheets & photos

to COASST

How Does COASST Work?


Number of Birds Found

Accuracy Increases with Prac#ce (June 2008 – May 2012)

0.00

0.10

0.20

0.30

0.40

0.50

0.60

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0.90

1.00

0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 400 450 500 550 600 650

% correct + correct unknown

% incorrect

Ra@o

of all Birds F

ound


0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

1-‐4 6-‐12 24+ Var

Percen

t of P

rojects

Number of Samples Annually

4+

3

2

1

Sampling Rate and Reten#on (sweet spots?)

Debey, Burgess, et al. in prep

annual sporadic, once

half-‐life of par@cipants, in years


COASST Par#cipant Time cumulaPve hours scaled to individual rectangle area, colored by year joined; 2112 people

Jane Dolliver, COASST; as of April 2013

2006

2009

2013

2003

1999

2012

2002

2007

2000

2005

2004

2008

2001

2011

2010


100

75

50

25

0 5/15 6/6 6/28 7/28 8/11

Survivorship (%

)

Date (2014)

D. Harvell, C. Gomes Cornell; C. Friedman, B. Swalla, J.K. Parrish UW

Sea Star Was#ng Disease (2014)


Design

Development

Delivery

Post-‐processing

Publica@on/Use

Iden@fy precision level •  % change needed •  % error tolerated

Match sampling scale to ques@on/issue •  extent •  grain •  longevity •  frequency

Match task(s) to par@cipant ability

verifica#on procedure

training •  expert-‐designed •  in-‐person •  on-‐line

par#cipant tes#ng •  pre & post-‐training •  in program (accuracy)

materials crea@on •  “grandma-‐tested” protocol •  cost scalable •  simple and tough

N ceiling: •  par@cipant limits •  number of par@cipants

N floor: •  system variability

intersects

Data Inges@on

peer-‐review

transcrip#on error eval •  contemporaneous collec@on/entry •  post-‐event entry

Data Quality Tipping Points in Ci#zen Science

analy#c approach

sampling error design •  mul@ple data collectors •  evidence •  over-‐sampling


advanced skills, deduc@on, mental models

Task Complexity

Sample Size (sites, par@cipants)

staPsPcal pruning

record verificaPon

“thinking” outsourced to scienPsts

“push bupon”

small, local

large, regional-‐global

why do it?!?

parPcipant profiling

Verifica#on Procedures in Ci#zen Science


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