You might not know it, but you’re probably a ‘citizen scientist’

Deep in the bush, beside the creek, you hear a crrrark. Or more a cuhrarrk. You aim your phone to capture the sound. Add the habitat, the water body. Maybe a photo if you spot the suspect. Next, you scroll other frog calls on the same app to speculate a match. Then submit.

Nice work. You’re now a citizen scientist, adding to the 691,659 ribbits received by the Australian Museum’s FrogID app, helping to locate and reveal 225 different species. Better yet, you learnt that croak was a Cophixalus petrophilus, or the blotched boulder frog.

The term might be controversial, but the practice has become vital to most research fields.Credit: Getty Images/iStockphoto

A small step for hobbyists, perhaps, but citizen science is a giant leap for most research fields. Birds and bees. Rock pools and rainfall. Though Peter Price, one reader, isn’t sold by the term: “We don’t hear of ‘citizen brain surgeons’ or ‘citizen air pilots’ – nor would many trust them if we did.”

“And yet,” adds Peter, “well-meaning amateurs are now called citizen scientists. People noting koala populations, say. A worthwhile contribution, if done correctly, but it’s not doing science. To suggest otherwise is to downplay what science really is.”

Theresa Larkin, a senior lecturer in medicine at Wollongong University, disagrees. “Science is about discovery and building knowledge about the world around us. Every time we move plants along a balcony to find the best spot, or test ingredients to enrich a pasta sauce – that’s science.”

Couple citizen with scientist, and your research team is richer. Peter is right about accuracy, of course. Hence ABC’s Galaxy Explorer, supplied duplicate sky-scans, as science reporter Belinda Smith explains: “In 2015, we asked people to look at galaxies and classify them into spiral, elliptical, and more.” With over 200,000 images to ponder, 10,000 extra eyes can help. “We made sure to show images multiple times to different participants to avoid misclassification.”

Zoe Kean, another in ABC’s science ranks, prefers community science. “That way, you don’t have to be a citizen to contribute! I’m all for broadening the term, not limiting.” Tracking the coinage, citizen scientist (the practitioner) predates the practice, the former emerging from a ufology article in New Scientist, back in 1979. A decade on, MIT papers adopted citizen science to boost environmental study.

Apps and smartphones only embedded the trend. So too the drive for scientists and us to build stronger ties. Dr Dave Watson, professor of ecology at Charles Sturt University, saw the need for “science to respond to criticism that so much what we do is behind closed doors”. Involving the public is “being more open about the process, not just the results.”

Or as Belinda Smith puts it: “Citizen science demystifies aspects of the scientific method for people – something that’s needed in a time where we’ve seen science under attack.” Flip it around, and eco-anxious citizens can find solace in assisting our planet. The benefits are mutual. At Monash’s School of Earth, Atmosphere and Environment, associate professor Ailie Gallant is grateful for extra eyes to gather and verify whole “petabytes” of historic weather data, making mammoth research projects suddenly possible.

Yet beyond the frogs, or Redmap’s fish tallies, or Fireballs in the Sky’s meteor meter, we are also citizen scientists by default. Says Dr Larkin: “Any time you contribute data online, rate a book, tap a phone, someone will analyse it to find new information, which is science.” Oxymoronic as citizen science may seem, the trend is too entrenched, too vital, to be considered a trend.

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