Exploring the participation of young citizen scientists in scientific research: The case of iNaturalist

Abstract

Online citizen science projects have broadened options for accessing science and enabled different forms of participation in scientific research for adult and young volunteers. Yet, little is known regarding participation patterns among youth participants. Quantitative approaches were used to investigate the contribution of 183 young volunteers to citizen science on the iNaturalist platform and the participation behaviour that relates to their contribution. The participants accessed and used iNaturalist as part of one-day field-based events (bioblitzes) facilitated by museums. Compared to the observation behaviour of all iNaturalist users, as documented on the platform, the young volunteers observe fewer plants and birds, and more molluscs, arachnids and insects. The average daily contributions of young volunteers were found to be positively associated with a large proportion of active days on iNaturalist and a systematic contribution behaviour, yet negatively related to a long duration on the platform. This study enhances our understanding of young volunteers' contributions to citizen science and provides insights for research on participation in online citizen science. Our findings have implications on how museums design the field-based events to encourage follow-up systematic participation and maintain active contribution.

Fig 1. Timeline-example of a young volunteer on iNaturalist, with the contributing days and the first and last contributing day of their activity on iNaturalist.

Figure inspired by Ponciano & Brasileiro [18]. The timeline (black arrow) starts with the first contributing day of a young volunteer and finishes on the date that data were downloaded for this study (31^st January 2020). The black boxes represent contributing days on iNaturalist and the white boxes represent days without a contribution. The small grey dotted line under the timeline counts the days between two consecutive contributing days. The grey line above the timeline indicates the days a young volunteer remained linked to the platform–from their first to their last contributing day. The black dotted line shows the days that a young volunteer could potentially be linked to iNaturalist–from their first day to the date that data were downloaded for this study (31^st January 2020).

Fig 2. Comparison of contributed organisms by young volunteers and observers overall.

This comparative bar chart shows the most observed organisms (%) by iNaturalist young volunteers taking part in this study (black bars) against the most observed organisms (%) observed by all iNaturalist users (grey bars). Young volunteers observe fewer plants and birds, but more molluscs, arachnids and insects.

Fig 3. Frequency distribution of observations by young people.

The histogram presents how many average observations young volunteers contributed daily on iNaturalist. The right skewed shape of the graph shows the asymmetrical daily contributing pattern with a large number of participants (n = 81) contributing less than 1 observation daily while 12 participants contribute beyond average (>27 observations).