The researchers cuducted a study on the effects of explicit incentives, such as competitions, and how they can influence participation in citizen science projects. In their approach, the authors focused on two leading online platforms for ecological observations in Germany and recorded the data entered by citizen scientists over a period of 120 days.
In their statistical analysis, the researchers show that a competition increased the number of reported nature observation data by around ten percent. These results suggest that explicit incentives can be an effective method to increase citizen participation in data collection for nature conservation. The paper "Explicit incentives increase citizen science recordings" in the journal "Conservation Letters" is available online with an open access license.
By the way: From April 1 to July 31, 2024, school classes, youth groups, families and individuals can once again take part in the Citizen Science Award and win prizes!