How Do Age and Attitudes Affect the Quality of Data Collected by Young Citizen Scientists in an Ecological Research Project?

ABSTRACT: Citizen science is increasingly used to collect ecological data. Specifically, participation of school students in authentic research has been suggested as having a multitude of benefits from serving as data collection to providing science education. Nevertheless, the overall quality and quantity of data is concerning for ecologists who are using data for research. In the Helsinki Urban Rat Project, lower- and upper secondary school students (13-19-year-old) collect data on urban rat occurrence using track plates that record rat footprints. I measured the success of school-aged citizen scientists in collecting and submitting data, and I determined the accuracy of the data they submitted by comparing their results to the results from professional researchers. Furthermore, I used additional

SUBMITTER: Aivelo T 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11467035 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature