Creating Positive Environmental Impact Through Citizen Science

Abstract

Interest in citizen science is growing, including from governments and research funders. This interest is often driven by a desire for positive environmental impact, and the expectation that citizen science can deliver it by engaging the public and simultaneously collecting environmental data. Yet, in practice, there is often a gap between expected and realised impact. To close this gap, we need to better understand pathways to impact and what it takes to realise them. We articulate six key pathways through which citizen science can create positive environmental change: (1) environmental management; (2) evidence for policy; (3) behaviour change; (4) social network championing; (5) political advocacy; and (6) community action. We explore the project attributes likely to create impact through each of these pathways and show that there is an interplay between these project attributes and the needs and motivations of target participant groups. Exploring this interplay, we create a framework that articulates four citizen science approaches that create environmental impact in different ways: place-based community action; interest group investigation; captive learning research; and mass participation census.

The Prevalence of Litter Foraging Among UK Birds Lessons Learned From A Citizen Science Project

“…Citizen science aims to educate and engage individuals from all backgrounds, whilst raising awareness of and solving real world issues, such as climate change and littering (Gura, 2013;Van Noordwijk et al, 2021). In this study, we aimed to engage individuals from a broad range of ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds in bird watching.…”

“…While not necessarily collecting much usable data and not a solution to other deterring factors such as racism, sexism, and financial constraints, this project seeks to help engage underrepresented groups by reducing the barrier of required prior knowledge and prior established contact with the bird community through our design of the questionnaire and use of recruitment channels. Recruitment of a citizen science sample not only provides the opportunity to engage different communities in bird watching, but it also presents the opportunity to educate people and encourage behavioural change initiatives (Van Noordwijk et al, 2021), such as reduced rates of littering. We focused on reaching groups currently underrepresented in birdwatching, in particular with regards to age and socioeconomic backgrounds.…”

When It Rains, It Pours: Integrating Citizen Science Methods to Understand Resilience of Urban Green Spaces

“…Furthermore, compaction and soil organic content data might indicate which factors are leading to low infiltration rate and thus provide opportunities for mitigation actions to improve infiltration, empowering the citizen scientist to take action based on their measurements. Citizen science has greatest impact when there is a potential call for action (van Noordwijk et al, 2021) and when that action is simple, engaging, and complies with local social norms (Rare The Behavioural Insights Team, 2019). The opportunity to modify local conditions to improve resilience to pluvial flooding represents a strong potential motivation for continued participation in this kind of citizen science activity.…”

The Value of Citizen Participation in Technology Assessment, Responsible Research and Innovation, and Sustainable Development

“…Because of this need for knowledge integration and openness to newness, SD is often practiced in experimental participatory formats such as urban laboratories, real-world experiments, and living labs [31][32][33]. "The involvement of citizens in scientific research and/or knowledge production, can complement and ultimately improve the SDG reporting process" [34] (p. 922) and improve the evidence-base for SD policies [35] (p. 373). It can also contribute to raising awareness for societal needs and environmental issues among both citizens and policy makers [36,37].…”