Reviewing citizen science and positioning concepts of passive and assertive inclusion

1. Citizen Science – between passive and
assertive inclusiveness
Muki Haklay, Extreme Citizen Science group
Department of Geography, UCL
Twitter: @mhaklay / @ucl_excites

2. • The spectrum of citizen science
• Inclusiveness in citizen science?
• Passive and assertive inclusiveness
Outline

3. CITIZEN SCIENCE

4. Volunteer computing

5. Volunteer Thinking

6. Biodiversity/Ecology
• Ecological observations of
plants and animals (esp.
birds)
• Big Garden Birdwatch – 1
hour, end of January,
structured reporting, and
over 500,000 participants
Participating in Big Garden
Birdwatch (source: RSPB)

7. Mapping for Change
Participatory Sensing

8. DIY Science
Imane Baiz, CRI Paris

9. DIY/Civic Science

10. Extreme citizen science

12. Towards Intelligent Maps

13. INCLUSION IN CITIZEN SCIENCE

14. • Among the general
population of EU 28, the
education attainment is 27%
tertiary education
(university).
• Variability: UK 37.6%, France
30.4%, Germany 23.8%, Italy
15.5%, Romania 15%
Educational attainment
27%
46%
27%
Education Attainment EU 28 (2015)
Up to Lower Secondary Upper secondary Tertiary education

15. OpenStreetMap (2010)
High School
or lower
(5%)
Some
College
(17%)
Undergraduate
(49%)
Masters
(21%)
Doctoral
(8%)
Budhathoki, N.R. and Haythornthwaite, C., 2013. Motivation for open collaboration crowd and community models and the case of OpenStreetMap. American Behavioral
Scientist, 57(5), pp.548-575.

16. Galaxy Zoo (2013)
High School or
unknown
35%
Undergraduate
33%
Masters
22%
Doctoral
10%
Raddick, M.J., Bracey, G., Gay, P.L., Lintott, C.J., Cardamone, C., Murray, P., Schawinski, K., Szalay, A.S. and Vandenberg, J., 2013. Galaxy Zoo: Motivations of citizen
scientists. arXiv preprint arXiv:1303.6886.

17. Transcribe Bentham (2012)
High School or
unknown
3%
Undergraduate
34%
Masters
39%
Doctoral
24%
Causer, T, and Wallace, V., 2012. Building a volunteer community: results and findings from Transcribe Bentham. Digital Humanities Quarterly , 6

18. • OpenStreetMap (2010) survey by Budhathoki – 97%
male
• Transcribe Bentham (2012) survey by Causer and
Wallace – almost 2/3 are female. Super volunteers
7/8 female
• IBM World Community Grid (2013) – 90% male
• Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission
(FWC) annual survey of Florida beaches for turtle
nests (2004) - older, well-educated, white females
Gender

19. Zooniverse volunteers (2014)

20. 7/6/2018Page 20
Daily checklists eBird (2017)

21. RANGE OF ACTIVITIES & INCLUSION

22. 64M UK population
8.5M BBC Attenborough & the Giant Dinosaur
520,000 in RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch
40,000 in British Trust of Ornithology surveys
500 in BioHacking & DIY Science
60,000 in Oxford ClimatePrediction.net
UK Engagement Escalator

23. Everyone
Consumption of science (passive/active)
Opportunistic or highly limited participation
Data collection and analysis
High engagement in DIY science
Joining volunteer computing or thinking
7 Levels of Engagement

24. • Passive inclusiveness – “we’ll build it and they’ll
come”. Websites, events, and processes that do not
intentionally put obstacles to the participation of
under-represented groups (most contributory
citizen science)
• Assertive inclusiveness – reaching out to under-
represented groups, considering what obstacles
they will face and taking them into account in the
design and implementation of a project
Passive vs Assertive inclusiveness

25. Passive & Assertive inclusiveness
Assertive inclusiveness
• High costs per participants
• Attention for “universal
usability”, accessibility, and
inclusive training
• Social benefit through
engagement with marginalised
groups
• Can lead to personal and group
empowerment
Passive inclusiveness
• Low recruitment costs
• Focus on the task and use of
jargon or complex technology
possible
• Social benefit through
engagement of highly
educated participants
• Can lead to personal
empowerment

26. • Citizen science offers a wide range of case studies
for inclusions
• Tensions exist in the meaning of participation and
inclusiveness
• By looking at passive and assertive inclusiveness,
we can notice benefits and limitations of different
positions across the spectrum
Summary

27. Acknowledgement
This talk would not be possible without the generosity of
the many people and communities that we have worked
with over the years…

28. Acknowledgement
… and the funders, project partners, and sponsors that
we’ve worked with (and will work with in the future)