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Bridging Indigenous and Western paradigms in research can offer benefits but it can also be challenging because of the need to navigate power dynamics and differences in perspectives. Amid the Western epistemic norms that dominate most academic spaces in Canada, researchers must endeavour to bridge paradigms in such a way that Indigenous rights to self-determination are upheld, ensuring that Indigenous paradigms or worldviews are not subsumed by or tokenized within Western paradigms. Researchers must also be able to demonstrate the coherence of their project, showing how all aspects fit well together despite the involvement of different perspectives. This article shares lessons learned from a research project in which we aimed to coherently bridge Inuit worldviews and the critical paradigm in a manner that foregrounds Inuit perspectives. We present an accountability framework that supported project planning and decision-making in alignment with our core project intentions by prioritizing requirements for paradigm bridging. This framework was guided by concepts from or based on Inuit knowledge (i.e., piliriqatigiinniq and the Qaggiq Model) and qualitative research (i.e., meaningful coherence). We draw examples from our study to illustrate how we strove to achieve a balanced, dynamic relationship between Inuit and Western epistemologies, which was facilitated by shared points of common ground. Intentional focus was required to continually resist and redress power imbalances. We emphasize the importance of reflexivity and humility to the whole endeavour, highlighting the relevance of researcher positionality from the perspective of the Qallunaaq (White) lead researcher. While acknowledging that any effort to bridge paradigms must be specific to context, we propose that following an iterative, collaborative, reflexive, dynamic and responsive process can enable accountability to Indigenous communities and fidelity to researcher intentions. Such actions support the production of research that is meaningful, valued and useful to the population it intends to serve.

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The Garden Dormouse has shown an ongoing decline over the last decades across large parts of its range. As the reasons for the species’ shrinking range are poorly understood, effective conservation actions have been lacking so far. The Germany- wide project “In Search of the Garden Dormouse” aims to investigate the causes, and develop concepts and measures to mitigate the decline. The current distribution has been assessed using a large-scale citizen science approach. More than 6,000 dormouse observations were gathered via an online reporting tool, of which >4,000 reports could be verified by photos, videos, or call recordings. Our aim was to obtain important information about the ecology of the species in different habitat types. For this, volunteers systematically collected approximately 1,000 Garden Dormouse droppings for food analysis, installed footprint tunnels and camera traps, helped to obtain several hundred DNA samples, collected > 500 carcasses, and recorded Garden Dormouse calls from various sampling sites. Volunteers also used a novel device for automated Garden Dormouse monitoring in the field that was developed and successfully applied in support of the project. The gathered data displays the current Garden Dormouse distribution in Germany and provides insights into the biology and ecology of this endangered, understudied species. The multidisciplinary approach of the project combined several disciplines, from field ecology to population genomics, in a fruitful cooperation of scientists, citizen scientists, and a conservation NGO. It can serve as a template for future projects aiming to produce large-scale scientific data in animal research and conservation.