Citizen science |
Corresponding author: Matt von Konrat ( mkonrat@fieldmuseum.org ) Academic editor: Franco Andreone
© 2024 Matt von Konrat, Yarency Rodriguez, Colleen Bailey, Gilbert F. Gwilliam III, Christine Christian, Blanka Aguero, June Ahn, Zoe Albion, James R. Allen, Colin Bailey, Erryn Blake, Winnie Blake, Gwen Blake, Laura Briscoe, Jessica M. Budke, Thomas Campbell, Matt Chansler, Dina Clark, Robin Delapena, Michael Denslow, Daniel Dodinval, Elana Dux, Shari Ellis, Elizabeth Ellwood, Mendkhuu Enkhbayer, Belle Ens, Nkosi Michael Evans, Alejandra Fabian, Adam Ferguson, Wyatt Gaswick, Kate Golembiewski, Sharon Grant, Lauren Hancock, Kimberly Hansen, Brittany Janney, Janeen Jones, Zachary Kachian, Maria Lucia Kawasaki, Kacee Kellum, Olivia Leek, Alan Lichamer, Crystal Maier, Austin Mast, Joann Lacey Martinec, Paul Mayer, Melissa Mladek, Ainun Nadhifah, Christopher Neefus, Mary Nodulman, Margaret Oliver, Kelsey Overberg, A. Townsend Peterson, Ayesha Qazi-Lampert, Carl Rothfels, Zoe Anne Ryan, Robert Salm, Dawn Schreiner, Matthew Schreiner, Eric J. Tepe, Maureen Turcatel, Amelia Vega, Heaven Wade, Kate Webbink, Dianne Weinand, Todd Widhelm, Miranda Zwingelberg.
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Citation:
von Konrat M, Rodriguez Y, Bailey C, Gwilliam III GF, Christian C, Aguero B, Ahn J, Albion Z, Allen JR, Bailey C, Blake E, Blake W, Blake G, Briscoe L, Budke JM, Campbell T, Chansler M, Clark D, Delapena R, Denslow M, Dodinval D, Dux E, Ellis S, Ellwood E, Enkhbayer M, Ens B, Evans NM, Fabian A, Ferguson A, Gaswick W, Golembiewski K, Grant S, Hancock L, Hansen K, Janney B, Jones J, Kachian Z, Kawasaki ML, Kellum K, Leek O, Lichamer A, Maier C, Mast A, Martinec JL, Mayer P, Mladek M, Nadhifah A, Neefus C, Nodulman M, Oliver M, Overberg K, Townsend Peterson A, Qazi-Lampert A, Rothfels C, Ryan ZA, Salm R, Schreiner D, Schreiner M, Tepe EJ, Turcatel M, Vega A, Wade H, Webbink K, Weinand D, Widhelm T, Zwingelberg M (2024) From spectators to stewards: Transforming public involvement in natural history collections. Natural History Collections and Museomics 1: 1-33. https://doi.org/10.3897/nhcm.1.138247
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A comprehensive overview of volunteer-driven public programs focused on activities to enhance natural history collections (NHCs) is provided. The initiative revolves around the WeDigBio events and the Collections Club at the Field Museum, aiming to deepen the public’s connection with scientific collections, enhance participatory science, and improve data associated with natural history specimens. The implementation and journey of these programs are outlined, including surveys conducted from 2015 through 2021 to gauge participant motivation, satisfaction, and the impact of these events on public engagement with NHCs. Results show trends in on-site and virtual volunteer participation over the years, especially during the peak period of the COVID-19 pandemic. The majority of participants expressed high satisfaction, indicating a willingness to continue participating in similar activities. The surveys revealed a shift towards more altruistic motivations for participation over time, with increased emphasis on supporting the Field Museum and contributing to the scientific community. The success of participatory science events demonstrates the potential of volunteer-driven programs to contribute meaningfully to the preservation, digitisation, and understanding of biodiversity collections, ultimately transforming spectators into stewards of natural history. From 2015 to present participants celebrate a significant milestone, with over a thousand community scientists contributing to the inventorying, collection care, curation, databasing, or transcription of 286,071 specimens, objects or records. We also discuss accuracy and quality control as well as a checklist and recommendations for similar activities.
Citizen science, community science, natural history collections, WeDigBio, curation, volunteering
Globally, thousands of institutions house nearly three billion scientific collections with associated metadata (
The infrastructure provided the foundation to expand over time to include ad hoc events providing opportunities for collaboration with other partners, including high school groups, and internally, with Institutional Advancement and their Corporate Program. Significantly, NSF-funded Thematic Collections Networks (TCNs) were able to leverage WeDigBio and Collections Club in crowdsourcing efforts for transcription of scientific labels. For example, “Building a Global Consortium of Bryophytes and Lichens: Keystones of Cryptobiotic Communities,” which is a collaboration of 25 universities, museums, and gardens located across the United States.
Participatory science, and the contributions to the field of science by “amateur” scientists, has been in use since the mid-1990’s. Data produced via crowd-sourcing has been shown to have huge impacts on data digitization efforts (
This paper outlines the journey of implementing public participation programs associated with WeDigBio and the development of a new initiative called the Collections Club. The major goals of these programs are to i) harness the enthusiasm generated by public events; ii) deepen the connection between scientific collections and the general public; iii) increase engagement through participatory science; and iv) improve and enhance physical specimens or data associated with scientific specimens and objects. The overarching aim is to provide a framework and insights to aid other similar participatory science events utilising natural history collections.
At the end of many WeDigBio and Collections Club events spanning from 2015 through until 2021, the volunteers were provided an anonymous link to a survey. Many of the event surveys were part of the broader WeDigBio campaigns and followed
Raw data for the participant surveys and other information is available in the Supplementary Files. Suppl. materials
Suppl. materials
Suppl. materials
Suppl. material
For the surveys, in some cases identical questions were asked over several years. In other cases, responses to similar questions were aggregated, e.g., questions about motivation for participating or willingness to participate in future activities. The exact questions that were asked as part of each survey are available in the raw data. Note also that many of the responses were on a Likert scale, e.g., Strongly Disagree, Disagree, Neither Agree nor Disagree, Agree, Strongly Agree. For clarity, the responses have been aggregated as Negative, Neutral, and Positive.
All graphics were prepared using R (R Core Team 2023). The graphs were specifically designed with colour blindness in mind, as many reports and publications do not take this into account (
Transcription platforms included Notes from Nature (
ChatGPT-4 was used to generate the Word Cloud from a PDF of responses to open ended questions and to provide an initial suggestion of categories for open ended questions, which was then modified and presented here.
Metrics from the outset of our public programs have been captured from 2015 to present (April 2024) and are presented below, as well as various surveys conducted from 2015 through to 2021.
Fig.
Collections Club/WeDigBio participants participating virtually in 2020 and then onsite in 2022. a: Virtual Collections Club/WeDigBio with mother and son transcribing remotely during the peak of the pandemic in 2020. b: Return to first onsite event in 2022 with volunteers masked following protocol at the time doing hands-on activities.
Items processed by participants in WeDigBio and Collections Club activities. a: Cumulative items (specimens, objects or records) processed by year. (through April 2024). b: Items/objects/records processed by broad project type: barcoding, bibliography, curation, georeferencing, inventory, database cleaning (IT work), human transcription for machine learning (ML training), scan/photo, transcription, Zooniverse.
Table listing National Science Foundation digitization projects under the Advancing Digitization of Biodiversity Collections (ADBC) program, which is a series of thematic collection networks (TCNs) based on an important research themes.
TCN Title | Year Volunteers Contribution | NSF Award No. | Lead Instiution |
---|---|---|---|
North American Lichens and Bryophytes: Sensitive Indicators of Environmental Quality and Change | 2011 Pre-curation; transcription | 1115116 | University of Wisconsin - Madison |
The Macroalgal Herbarium Consortium: Accessing 150 Years of Specimen Data to Understand Changes in the Marine/Aquatic Environment | 2013 Transcription | 1304924 | University of New Hampshire |
The Pteridological Collections Consortium: An Integrative Approach to Pteridophyte Diversity Over the Last 420 Million Years | 2018 Barcoding; transcription | 1802504 | University of California - Berkeley |
Building a Global Consortium of Bryophytes and Lichens: Keystones of Cryptobiotic Communities | 2020 Pre-curation; transcription | 2001500 | University of Tennessee - Knoxville |
Digitization and Enrichment of U.S. Herbarium Data from Tropical Africa to Enable Urgent Quantitative Conservation Assessments | 2022 Barcoding | 2223875 | University of Kansas |
Figs
Motivation for participating in WeDigBio events between 2016–2018, as reported in survey responses; 2016 n = 62, 2017 n = 34, 2018 n = 58. Classifications in responses included: ‘Thought it would be fun’, ‘help the scientific community’, ‘help the Field Museum’, ‘for a class, interest in natural history’, ‘interest in museums’, ‘like to volunteer’, ‘meet like-minded people’ and ‘other’.
Fig.
Responses to questions about possible future participation. a: Response to question: How likely is it that you would volunteer to transcribe specimen labels on a regular basis? for 2015–2018. b: Response to question: How likely is it that you would participate in another event? for 2015–2020.
Complete responses from all years to the open-ended questions are available in Suppl. materials
Participants were surveyed between 2015 and 2018 asking about their awareness of the number (Fig.
A similar survey was conducted in 2020 and 2021 about awareness of the type of research conducted on NHCs, but phrased slightly differently. In 2021 there was an increase of those who remained neutral to the question, which might be attributed to those who had participated the year before. In 2020, the question was asked if respondents had learned new information about the significance of NHCs at the museum - 88% agreed.
Over the four years, greater than 90% of respondents agreed that biodiversity research collections merit public funding (Fig.
The results of a participant survey for the years 2015 to 2018 showing ratings in response to the question: Rate your awareness now compared to prior to participating in the event: a: Pooled responses to the three questions below. b: Of the number of biodiversity specimens held in collections, by year. c: Of the kinds of biodiversity specimens held in collections, by year. d: Of the value of biodiversity specimens held in collections, by year.
Complete responses from all years to the open-ended questions are available in Suppl. materials
For the open-ended question ‘What did you find most enjoyable or satisfying about participating in your local WeDigBio Event?’ we categorised into eight broad buckets (Fig.
Fig.
Fig.
Responses to survey questions from virtual WeDigBio/Collections Club events in 2020 and 2021. a: Responses to survey questions for a virtual event in 2021: “Have you participated before?” and “Would you participate in-person despite the pandemic?”. b: Responses to survey question for 2020 and 2021 events: “How likely are you to participate in a virtual event again?”.
This paper provides insights from volunteers participating in community science events involving NHCs. The fundamental objectives of these initiatives are to 1) Increase engagement through participatory science; 2) Evaluate the motivation and driving forces behind participatory scientists and their engagement with NHCs; 3) Improve and/or enhance physical specimens or data associated with scientific specimens and objects through focused volunteer programs, including quality of contribution; 4) Augment the quality and value of physical samples or data related to scientific specimens and artefacts. Outlined below is also a brief discussion on accuracy, quality control, a checklist for events, and recommendations.
Natural history collections are uniquely poised to broaden access and opportunities for public engagement (
Our surveys broadly indicate that participatory scientists, after participating in the WeDigBio and Collections Club events, were motivated to contribute to research, help the scientific community, and the Field Museum more generally (Figs
The level of accuracy and quality control depends on the type of project, the length of an event, and volunteers’ backgrounds, ages, and skill levels with technology. Thus, projects can be tailored accordingly. Informative instruction and immediate feedback help increase levels of accuracy. Minor elements can be also implemented to increase engagement, for example, we noted when we began public programming, some students would not pay attention to detail. However, if they were informed that a points system was set in place by their instructor, a notable change in attention and engagement was observed.
Transcription platforms have different mechanisms for evaluating accuracy and quality control. Procedures can be put in place at the front end, e.g., drop- down menu for country, state etc., reducing errors. Symbiota employs an approach in which one volunteer transcribes and then a second validates the transcription (
Similarly, when designing a hands-on activity, the choice of activity depends on factors such as time allotment, audience background, and mobility access. For on-site activities, project leaders were constantly on hand, giving immediate feedback and evaluating the quality of work being accomplished. Project leaders were largely pleased with levels of accuracy, and some projects evolved over time. For many large scale ongoing hands-on projects, some volunteers became so confident, engaged, and skillful, that they became co-managers in follow-up events. An excellent example is the conversion of over 20,000 specimens of liverworts transferred from newspaper to packets for accessibility, achieved by Collection Club members spanning several years (
A detailed event checklist is provided in Suppl. material
The Mobile Museum, initiated by two fifth graders (Fig.
Participatory science programs emphasise the transformative impact of public participation in NHCs in accelerating scientific discovery and fostering a deeper engagement connection. Details about the implementation of these programs are provided, including surveys conducted to gauge participant motivation, satisfaction, and the impact of these events on public understanding with NHCs. The engagement in these volunteer activities not only increased awareness of the value of biodiversity specimens but also underscored the importance of public funding for biodiversity research collections. Successful programs address challenges by continuously evaluating and adapting public programming strategies (
The generous support by the National Science Foundation (Award No.’s 1145898, 1115002 1458300, 1541506, 2001509 and 0531730) is gratefully acknowledged. We also recognise the Museum Collection Spending Fund and the Grainger Bioinformatics Center, administered by the Field Museum, towards supporting interns and digital imaging assets. The Student Center for Science Engagement at Northeastern Illinois University, the Dean's Undergraduate Fellowship, College of Science and Health, DePaul University, and the Field Museums Prince Fellowship helped provide funding for student interns. We also thank Prof. Julian Kerbis and Prof. Michael Bryson at Roosevelt University for internship and course credit opportunities for students as well as their support of mutual programs. Many volunteers and interns as well as dozens of members of the Field Museum Collections Club – a group of volunteers that meet every quarter. A special thank you to these Collection Club members for their dedicated efforts to our biological collections over the years; especially Abigail Cecilia Zesati, Ali Aguilar, Anne Stake, Bill Carroll, Bim Zander, Irwin Blumensaadt, Jeanie Vondriska, Joan Dittman, June Novalich, Karen Jellema, Lisa Lisowy, Mary Konkel, Mena Ryan, Meredith Brooks, Philip Dittman, Rayna Scott, Sarah Beaster, and Sena Blumensaadt. We would like to recognize the impressive voluntary commitment demonstrated by Bank of America, Citadel, CNA Insurance, Exelon Corporation, JPMorgan Chase, Northern Trust, and U.S. Bank to further the accessibility of biological data. Thank you to the many current and former Field Museum staff for their continuous support of WeDigBio and Collections Club in numerous ways ranging from technical support, presentations, hosting projects, through to advertising. These include: Jingmai O’Connor, Amber Sreniawski, Amy Rogaliner, Armand Esai, Az Klymiuk, Beth McDonald, Chris McGarrity, Jaclyn Johnston, Christine Giannoni, Christine Niezgoda, Cynthia Vasquez, Dixie Ost, Gretchen Rings, Joshua Mata, Kevin Swagel, Michelle Rivera, Mae Riordan, Megan Bradley, Rebekah Shuman Baquiran, Susan Mochel, Theresa O’Reilly, and Tomomi Suwa as well as many other researchers and scientists who gave up their valuable time to share their research.
Many commendations to our partners in the NSF funded ‘Building a global consortium of bryophytes and lichens: keystones of cryptobiotic communities’ (GLOBAL) for their organisation, administration, and support in hosting the online sessions for WeDigBio especially towards Alan Franck, Chelsea Smith, Scott LaGreca, and Teresa Iturriaga (NSF Award No. 2001509). Thank you to Benjamin Muddiman, Cindy Looy, and Ivo Duijnstee, who are our colleagues at University of California, Berkeley for co-hosting online WeDigBio sessions during the pandemic. We also thank the many other NSF funded Thematic Collection Networks (TCNs) that have played a big role in WeDigBio and Collections Club including
Thank you to our local educators and students at Aurora University, Chicago Math and Science Academy, Galileo Scholastic Academy of Math and Science, Northeastern Illinois University, Northside College Preparatory High School, Oswego High School, Prairie State College, and Roosevelt University. Thank you to Bryonet for posting announcements for volunteer events. We deeply appreciate platforms such as Symbiota and Zooniverse that allow the generation, collection, storage, and management of biological data. We thank the Institutional Review Board of Field Museum, especially the Chairs, Lisa C. Niziolek and Deborah Bekken, for their valuable time. Significantly, we thank Aurelio’s Pizza (South Loop) and Egg Harbor Cafe for refreshments throughout the public events over the years. We also thank Prof. Jennifer Slate as well as Assoc. Prof. Melanie Pivarski for their helpful comments, suggestions and edits that led to an improvement of the original manuscript. We thank the Chairs, under the auspices of the Institutional Review Board, Field Museum. Finally, we are grateful for the enourmous and positive media coverage generated by a range of outlets, ranging from print, newspapers, blogs to tv. A full list is provided in Suppl. material
The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.
Institutional Review Board approval was sought for the surveys, but considered exempt as no identifying information was collected and all respondents were adults.
The generous support by the National Science Foundation (Award No.’s 1145898, 1115002 1458300, 1541506, 2001509 and 0531730) is gratefully acknowledged.
All authors broadly contributed and had various roles including Conceptualization, Methodology, Software, Validation, Formal analysis, Investigation, Resources, Data Curation, Writing - Original draft, Writing - Review and Editing, Visualization, Supervision, Project administration, Funding Acquisition. These are listed individually for each author.
Conceptualization: JMB, JLLM, YR, AQL, RD, AF, MD, MLK, AF, WG, BA, LH, PM, KK, CM, GFG, MT, AM, EE, MK, MZ. Data curation: LB, DW, MM, CB, LH, ZA, KW, RS, WB, GB, MS, AL, JJ, MD, PM, MK, CM, AN, AF, TC, NMME, DD, EJT, YR, ME, CN, JLLM, ZK, CR, OL, AM, EE, GFG, DC, CC, MC, WG, MLK, KH, BA, MO, JA, TW, ED, MN, ATP, JMB, RD, MT, BE, JRRA, HW, ZAR, EB, DS, AV, KK, AF, SG, MZ. Formal analysis: SE, GFFGI, BJ. Investigation: SE, BJ. Methodology: KK, GFG, GB, AF, MS, MO, AV, MN, KH, YR, EB, MM, WB, DC, JLLM, EE, JA, HW, DW, ZK, SE, CB, TW, PM, CB, ZA, CM, AM, WG, RS, DS, BJ, MZ, TC. Project administration: AM, AF, CB, BE, DC, MC, KK, CC, HW, WG, EE, MO, RS, KH, EB, MZ, JA, PM, TW, CM, BA, JMB, TC, GB, LB, AQL, CN, WB, MM, YR, DW, JLLM, ZA, CR, ZK, MT, KG, ATP, CB, JRRA. Resources: DC, BA, MK, EE, ATP, SG, KW, JJ, PM, CM, TC, AQL, YR, JLLM, AM, CC, WG, KH, TW, LB, MT, HW, AV, KK, AF, KO, DW, CB, ZA, RS, MZ, JRRA, JMB, MO, MC, KG, CR, CN, ME, MD. Software: MD. Supervision: MZ, BE, MT, ME, JRRA, RD, LB, TW, MK, JMB, KH, BA, WG, MO, CC, MLK, MS, ZA, CB, MM, EJT, MN, KO, DS, EB, ZAR, MC, DC, OL, ZK, JLLM, YR, AQL, AL, NMME, DD, TC, AN, AF, JJ, SG, EE, ED, GB, WB. Visualization: GFFGI, BJ. Writing - original draft: CB, BJ, GFG, CC, MK. Writing - review and editing: MK, CB.
Matt von Konrat https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9579-5325
Yarency Rodriguez https://orcid.org/0009-0009-4253-8355
Gilbert F. Gwilliam III https://orcid.org/0009-0006-4072-3539
Christine Christian https://orcid.org/0009-0009-1293-5931
Blanka Aguero https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8442-5409
Zoe Albion https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8694-0049
Jessica M. Budke https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1149-1522
Thomas Campbell https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4228-9685
Dina Clark https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7713-9877
Robin Delapena https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2261-0208
Michael Denslow https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5431-3542
Shari Ellis https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0635-1306
Elizabeth Ellwood https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1602-1917
Adam Ferguson https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6931-6420
Sharon Grant https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0201-732X
Janeen Jones https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1261-8049
Zachary Kachian https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0500-0339
Crystal Maier https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6435-2775
Austin Mast https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4995-0467
Joann Lacey Martinec https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9902-4947
Paul Mayer https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0143-1227
Melissa Mladek https://orcid.org/0009-0009-9169-5963
Ainun Nadhifah https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0575-4306
Christopher Neefus https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0562-4993
Mary Nodulman https://orcid.org/0009-0005-2210-5780
A. Townsend Peterson https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0243-2379
Ayesha Qazi-Lampert https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5733-0911
Zoe Anne Ryan https://orcid.org/0009-0001-9077-9171
Robert Salm https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8579-7439
Eric J. Tepe https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8493-0736
Kate Webbink https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8347-0942
Todd Widhelm https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6453-3429
All of the data that support the findings of this study are available in the main text or Supplementary Information.
2015 WeDigBio Field Museum Survey Results
Data type: pdf
Explanation note: Survey results for first WeDigBio event at the Field Museum, 2015.
2016 WeDigBio Field Museum survey results
Data type: pdf
Explanation note: Survey results from 2016 Field Museum WeDigBio event.
2017 WeDigBio/Collections Club Field Museum Survey results
Data type: pdf
Explanation note: Results from survey of the 2017 Field Museum joint WeDigBio and Collections Club event taken place in October 2017.
2018 WeDigBio/Collections Club Field Museum Survey Results
Data type: pdf
Explanation note: Responses from the 2018 Field Museum WeDigBio/Collections Club event survey.
April 2017 Collections Club Survey Responses
Data type: pdf
Explanation note: Survey responses from the April 2017 Collections Club event.
Responses to survey for Earth Day, Community Science Month, WeDigBio Lite and Collections Club (April 2020)
Data type: pdf
Explanation note: Responses to survey for Earth Day, Community Science Month, WeDigBio Lite and Collections Club (April 2020).
Highlights of a selection of responses to open-ended questions from surveys undertaken between 2015 onwards
Data type: pdf
Explanation note: Highlights of a selection of responses to open-ended questions. All responses can be accessed in Suppl. materials
2021 Collections Club/WeDigBio Survey Responses - for event held on Oct. 2021
Data type: pdf
Explanation note: Spreadsheet of raw responses to November distributed 2021 survey, for Collections Club/WeDigBio event held on Oct. 2021. Includes some collation of data.
Volunteer Events Tracking and Metrics - these include WeDigBio, Collections Club, Corporate volunteer events etc.
Data type: pdf
Explanation note: Data on attendance and activities for volunteer events at the Field Museum 2015–2024.
Checklist for Citizen Science Events
Data type: pdf
Summary of media coverage highlights of WeDigBio and Collections Club hosted by Field Museum
Data type: pdf
Explanation note: This is a list of print, tv, online media highlights that covered from 2016 through to 2022.