Weather-it: evolution of an online community for citizen inquiry

Abstract

While Citizen Science projects involve people in passive or active project tasks, Citizen Inquiry offers the opportunity for deeper involvement through initiating and facilitating science investigations. This study aims to explore the creation and evolution of Weather-it, a Citizen Inquiry online community hosted by the nQuire-it platform. Weather-it enables people to create and maintain their own weather missions (investigations), to which other people can contribute. The evolution of Weather-it community is explored through social network graphs of Weather-it members and their interactions. Information regarding other aspects of the community such as the type of members, their recruitment and motivations, and the identity and sustainability of the community, is collected through a survey comprising open and closed-ended questions. The results indicate differences in these community engagement aspects between Citizen Science and Citizen Inquiry projects, providing insight into the behaviour of people in projects that require more active involvement throughout the scientific investigations.