The Effect of the COVID-19 Pandemic and Associated Restrictions on Participation in Community and Citizen Science

Drill, Sabrina L.; Rosenblatt, Connor; Cooper, Caren B.; Cavalier, Darlene; Ballard, Heidi L.

doi:10.5334/cstp.463

Cited by 4 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 28 publications

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“…However, restrictions from the pandemic appear to have restricted outdoor activities, resulting in more localized observations for citizen science programs. Several studies documented increases in urban wildlife observations but declines in more natural areas (Randler et al 2020;Rose et al 2020;Basile et al 2021;Crimmins et al 2021;Kishimoto and Kobori 2021;Sanchez-Clavijo et al 2021;Drill 2022;Stenhouse et al 2022). Overall, these changes in citizen science programs, both in terms of participation and results, suggest that care must be taken when using and interpreting the 2020 data.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…One state or province was chosen randomly within each major geographic region of North America. This subset covers a range of legal restrictions due to the pandemic (Drill et al 2022) and both rural areas and major population centers. For this subset, I collected data on the number of participants in each count, total effort for each count, and the number of species recorded per count.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…These effects were seen globally (Rose et al 2020;Crimmins et al 2021;Dorler and Heigl 2021;Kishimoto and Kobori 2021;Sanchez-Clavijo et al 2021;Stenhouse et al 2022), but were most pronounced during the strictest lockdowns during the spring and early summer of 2020. Within the United States, restrictions varied by state (Drill et al 2022), particularly by December, when CBC was scheduled. Take, for example, the differences between California and Alabama.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Citizen Science and the Pandemic: A Case Study of the Christmas Bird Count

Coldren

2022

CSTP

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Citizen science has contributed much to our knowledge of North American birds, with programs like Christmas Bird Count (CBC) providing valuable data on population dynamics, winter distribution, irruption patterns, range expansions, invasion dynamics, community ecology, and the effects of climate change. However, the novel coronavirus pandemic of 2020 had the potential to restrict participation and detrimentally impact the scientific value of 2020 count results. CBC data from throughout North America for 2020 were compared to trends from the previous ten years. Participation was reduced in several ways, including number of counts, number of participants, and spatial distribution of counts. However, based on a subset of states and provinces, number of species recorded was not impacted. Care should be taken when using 2020 CBC data for studies requiring fine-scale geographic resolution.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Citizen Science and the Pandemic: A Case Study of the Christmas Bird Count

Coldren

2022

CSTP

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“…Additionally, new projects have been developed to provide a source of data during lockdowns and to create opportunities for students to engage in the scientific process remotely (Arbeláez-Cortés et al 2021;Oberbauer et al 2021). Outdoor projects that can be conducted at home were particularly popular during the early months of the pandemic (Drill et al 2022).…”

Section: Ecologicalmentioning

confidence: 99%

Accessibility of Participation in a Pollinator-Focused Community Science Project

Lynch

Miller

2023

CSTP

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Ecological research, education, and community engagement were interrupted globally in the spring and summer of 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic. To allow for continued data collection and to provide opportunities for people to interact with nature, we developed a community science project focusing on pollinator visitation to gardens and lawns. To evaluate the accessibility of this project to volunteers, we conducted 28 semistructured interviews with people who participated in the project training. Interviewees experienced a number of barriers to participation, the most common of which were difficulty with the data collection procedure (n = 22), challenges using technology (n = 11), and lack of access to technology (n = 9). However, components of the online training and data collection procedure helped overcome some of these barriers. Strategies such as using a hybrid training format, simplifying the use of technology during training, and incorporating active learning into online workshops could increase participation in community science projects, both in the context of the pandemic and moving forward.

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