Dataset Information

Worldwide Engagement for Digitizing Biocollections (WeDigBio): The Biocollections Community's Citizen-Science Space on the Calendar.

ABSTRACT: The digitization of biocollections is a critical task with direct implications for the global community who use the data for research and education. Recent innovations to involve citizen scientists in digitization increase awareness of the value of biodiversity specimens; advance science, technology, engineering, and math literacy; and build sustainability for digitization. In support of these activities, we launched the first global citizen-science event focused on the digitization of biodiversity specimens: Worldwide Engagement for Digitizing Biocollections (WeDigBio). During the inaugural 2015 event, 21 sites hosted events where citizen scientists transcribed specimen labels via online platforms (DigiVol, Les Herbonautes, Notes from Nature, the Smithsonian Institution's Transcription Center, and Symbiota). Many citizen scientists also contributed off-site. In total, thousands of citizen scientists around the world completed over 50,000 transcription tasks. Here, we present the process of organizing an international citizen-science event, an analysis of the event's effectiveness, and future directions-content now foundational to the growing WeDigBio event.

SUBMITTER: Ellwood ER

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5862351 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Publications

Worldwide Engagement for Digitizing Biocollections (WeDigBio): The Biocollections Community's Citizen-Science Space on the Calendar.

Ellwood Elizabeth R ER Kimberly Paul P Guralnick Robert R Flemons Paul P Love Kevin K Ellis Shari S Allen Julie M JM Best Jason H JH Carter Richard R Chagnoux Simon S Costello Robert R Denslow Michael W MW Dunckel Betty A BA Ferriter Meghan M MM Gilbert Edward E EE Goforth Christine C Groom Quentin Q Krimmel Erica R ER LaFrance Raphael R Martinec Joann Lacey JL Miller Andrew N AN Minnaert-Grote Jamie J Nash Thomas T Oboyski Peter P Paul Deborah L DL Pearson Katelin D KD Pentcheff N Dean ND Roberts Mari A MA Seltzer Carrie E CE Soltis Pamela S PS Stephens Rhiannon R Sweeney Patrick W PW von Konrat Matt M Wall Adam A Wetzer Regina R Zimmerman Charles C Mast Austin R AR

Bioscience 20180117 2

The digitization of biocollections is a critical task with direct implications for the global community who use the data for research and education. Recent innovations to involve citizen scientists in digitization increase awareness of the value of biodiversity specimens; advance science, technology, engineering, and math literacy; and build sustainability for digitization. In support of these activities, we launched the first global citizen-science event focused on the digitization of biodivers ...[more]

PMID: 29599548

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Project description:BACKGROUND:The language of "participant-driven research," "crowdsourcing" and "citizen science" is increasingly being used to encourage the public to become involved in research ventures as both subjects and scientists. Originally, these labels were invoked by volunteer research efforts propelled by amateurs outside of traditional research institutions and aimed at appealing to those looking for more "democratic," "patient-centric," or "lay" alternatives to the professional science establishment. As mainstream translational biomedical research requires increasingly larger participant pools, however, corporate, academic and governmental research programs are embracing this populist rhetoric to encourage wider public participation. DISCUSSION:We examine the ethical and social implications of this recruitment strategy. We begin by surveying examples of "citizen science" outside of biomedicine, as paradigmatic of the aspirations this democratizing rhetoric was originally meant to embody. Next, we discuss the ways these aspirations become articulated in the biomedical context, with a view to drawing out the multiple and potentially conflicting meanings of "public engagement" when citizens are also the subjects of the science. We then illustrate two uses of public engagement rhetoric to gain public support for national biomedical research efforts: its post-hoc use in the "care.data" project of the National Health Service in England, and its proactive uses in the "Precision Medicine Initiative" of the United States White House. These examples will serve as the basis for a normative analysis, discussing the potential ethical and social ramifications of this rhetoric. We pay particular attention to the implications of government strategies that cultivate the idea that members of the public have a civic duty to participate in government-sponsored research initiatives. We argue that such initiatives should draw from policy frameworks that support normative analysis of the role of citizenry. And, we conclude it is imperative to make visible and clear the full spectrum of meanings of "citizen science," the contexts in which it is used, and its demands with respect to participation, engagement, and governance.

Dataset Information

Worldwide Engagement for Digitizing Biocollections (WeDigBio): The Biocollections Community's Citizen-Science Space on the Calendar.

Publications

Worldwide Engagement for Digitizing Biocollections (WeDigBio): The Biocollections Community's Citizen-Science Space on the Calendar.

Similar Datasets

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