Community science can be used to collect larger datasets and engage the public in their work. The data collected in this way is questionable.
This way, scientists can collect and analyze more information quicker than they might be able to otherwise, and possibly save on research costs as well.
Accurately and consistently collecting scientific data is one of the main tenets. The quality of data produced by community science participants is only as good as the quality of their work.
The public is able to get closer to specimen, without affecting their preservation, because of the digitization of the herbarium collections. The museum's specimen collection is still so far under utilized.
Matt Von Konrat is the head of plant collections at the Chicago Field Museum.
Crowd-sourced data collection projects have the potential to greatly accelerate biodiversity discovery and documentation.
The public's interest can speed up the process. It makes sense to use the foot traffic of people who are interested in the museum's collection.
Researchers used data from a kiosk to test the approach. The kiosk gave participants an animation on how to measure the leaves of a plant.
Participants were shown a randomly selected image of a specimen from the museum's collection and asked to make their own measurement.
The patrons were told to draw intersecting lines across the lobule. They were asked to make lines that intersect at right angles and record a measurement for each line. The images were scaled so that they were small enough to be seen by a human.
The data on the participants' ages was summarized as children, teens, and adults.
To find out if there was a statistically significant difference between the two groups, the researchers compared the two groups using the same methods.
The researchers said that older age groups would be able to provide better data than children, and that about 50 percent of measurements would make it through the data cleaning process.
"We didn't know if there would be kids drawing pictures on the touchscreen instead of measuring leaves, or if they would be able to follow the instructions as well as the adults did," said Melanie Pivarski, lead researcher.
The study found that 60 percent of the entries were on par with the experts' measurement.
"All age groups from young children, families, youth, and adults were able to generate high-quality data sets, making observations and preparing measurements, and at the same time empowering community scientists through authentic contributions to science," von Konrat says
The children did a great job completing the task.
The kiosk was part of the exhibit Specimens: Unlocking the Secrets of Life at the field museum. It was included in a number of events in the year.
In the Specimens exhibit, 41 percent of the data entered by children were similar enough to be used for research.
Kids under 10 make up 50 percent of the data at the Science Hub.
The researchers said that children did a great job following instructions.
The new findings give merit to community science projects and suggest that they can be used to engage the public in scientific research and gather some good data.
The paper was published in research ideas and outcomes
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