Community science最新文献

Local governments and environmental nonprofits are increasingly using trash traps to intercept and remove escaped plastics and other litter from stormwater systems and surface waters. In this paper, we demonstrate the utility of these devices for collecting data that provide insights into riverine litter sources and solutions. Between 2021 and 2024, seven Waterkeeper organizations in North Carolina maintained 21 in-stream trash traps in watersheds across the state and trained staff and volunteers to record the types and quantities of litter during cleanouts. Over this period, Waterkeeper organizations and their volunteers documented 150,750 pieces of litter captured by traps. Captured litter overwhelmingly comprised plastic that floats and is resistant to biodegradation. Litter accumulation rates were moderately positively correlated with the percentages of developed land and impervious surface as well as road and ambient population density in the associated watershed. In some traps, litter accumulation rates were also positively correlated with precipitation rates. Beyond understanding riverine plastic pollution, this paper also provides insights on challenges and opportunities that arise from using trash traps to collect data on riverine litter.

To increase the understanding of shellfish toxin risks and support safe harvesting practices, the Sitka Tribe of Alaska develops and organizes environmental education programs. This study (ClinicalTrials.gov ID: NCT05247229) evaluates the Tribe's new middle school program, drawing on the theory of planned behavior to investigate pre-post-program shifts in beliefs and behavioral intentions related to shellfish harvesting and mitigating exposure risks by checking a tribally run website with near real-time toxin level data. Participants included 50 middle school students across three Southeast Alaska communities—Sitka, Hoonah, and Juneau. Research activities included pre- and post-program surveys and interviews. We used generalized estimating equation linear regression of survey data to investigate pre-post-program changes in beliefs and behavioral intentions related to shellfish harvesting and risk reduction and how changes in beliefs relate to changes in behavioral intentions. Interviews contextualized beliefs and behavioral intentions measured in surveys. Following the program, participants reported more positive perceptions and increased behavioral intentions related to shellfish harvesting and checking toxin levels, although differences emerged across sites and Alaska Native identity. Participants' understanding of the risk reduction strategy and confidence in abilities to check toxin levels also increased, suggesting that integrating risk perception in the theory of planned behavior and practical risk reduction strategies in environmental education tailored to local ecological and cultural contexts can be effective in promoting safe behaviors. Additionally, participants emphasized the influence of their family's harvesting practices on their beliefs and behaviors, suggesting the importance of family engagement in environmental education.

While research exploring factors related to farmers' mental health has been conducted more extensively in the past decade, much of the published literature in this domain focuses on acute stress and mental health challenges, rather than long term worries of agricultural producers. The purpose of this study was to use a systems-based approach to explore farmers' concerns for the future of agriculture, both in the context of their own operations and the industry as a whole. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 31 managers and owners of small- to mid-sized farms in Georgia. Interview recordings were transcribed, and inductive coding was used for data analysis. Farmers' concerns for the future of their own operations were driven by financial stress, challenges finding and retaining workers for their operations, increased regulatory pressure, and worries about farm succession planning. Many of these concerns were connected to larger concerns about the future of agriculture as a whole, which were primarily related to a widening disconnect between farmers and the general population, the gradual consolidation of farming operations under corporate ownership, and changing weather patterns that threatened established patterns of agricultural production and compounded other issues in the agricultural industry to threaten domestic food security. By focusing on future concerns rather than acute occupational stressors, this study highlights factors that impact farmers' mental health that fall outside the scope of community or individual interventions, and require a systems-based approach to address institutional drivers of stress and poor mental health among farmers.

Smallholder farming has in China been viewed as a practice needing transformation. Its relationship with rural development and economic growth has been frequently analyzed in China. Government-led initiatives promoting the integration of smallholder operations with industrialized agriculture have resulted in collaboration models between smallholders and large-scale agribusiness. Circular agriculture understood as an agricultural practice that enhances economic and ecological sustainability represents one of the mechanisms through which such collaboration can take place. While this collaboration provides smallholders with opportunities for increased productivity and income, it also carries the risk of marginalization. This study examines the collaboration between agricultural capital and smallholders in southwest China focusing on an integrated pomelo planting and a pig breeding project. The varying interests and risks faced by smallholders, government agencies, agricultural cooperatives, private enterprises, and financial institutions are explored. Findings suggest that local governments play a key role in facilitating the introduction of capital and affording the initial costs of organizing smallholders, while agricultural cooperatives decoupling smallholders from capital are central to the operation of large-scale production models. However, findings also show that local government involvement is often politically motivated, that smallholders' autonomy and voice in decision-making are limited, and that a risk of exploiting their interests under the guise of institutional innovation remains. The viability of these collaboration models lies thus rather in its ability to attract new producers and create jobs particularly for returning migrants or local smallholders. The findings could offer a potential pathway for addressing the agricultural transformation challenges facing China.

Between 2018 and 2022, representatives of local Indigenous Māori communities and emergency management worked in partnership with physical and social scientists during the planning, deployment, and management of a temporary seismometer network around Taupō volcano. This deployment formed part of the Eruption or Catastrophe: Learning to Implement Preparedness for future Supervolcano Eruptions (ECLIPSE) project designed to increase understanding of the large caldera volcanoes in the central North Island of Aotearoa New Zealand. Here we critically reflect on this co-production approach to geophysical network deployment and associated volcano research. We identified a central theme of the creating and holding of space for researchers and communities to engage in the activities through adopting a co-production approach, that embeds representatives of local Iwi (tribal groups) Te Arawa and Ngāti Tūwharetoa as key researchers within a broad project team. We worked to ensure we were respecting communities' time, protocols, and decisions; and to exchange knowledge about the research and results with landowners, community leaders, schools, and young people. Time spent kanohi ki te kanohi (face-to-face) built relationships and trust within and outside the research team that have lasted beyond the scope of the ECLIPSE program. We detail our experiences in the hope of demonstrating that this approach to research is a possible and desirable path for future fieldwork-based research.

Co-production of knowledge (CPK) is a process of bringing together diverse perspectives from researchers, agency, and community partners to achieve a shared research goal. The main objective of this article is to provide tools for achieving CPK in research projects, especially with Alaska Native and Arctic Indigenous communities. Team members need to understand their positionality and be aware of assumptions and biases to come to jointly agreed upon project priorities. To assist researchers in reflecting on their positionality, we present research paradigm dispositions from commonly trained methodologies and academic norms. Differences across the dispositions are highlighted in decision-making, success metrics, evaluation, and validation of outputs. Factors of Success were synthesized from existing literature on CPK, boundary spanning, the science of team science, convergence, Indigenous methodologies, and best practices to understand the CPK process. These Factors of Success are presented in a typical project life cycle logic model, categorized into inputs, process, and outcomes. Given the limited time and resources of research projects and activities, some factors will be given stronger emphasis over others. This article provides tools for transparent communication between researchers and community or agency partners.

The goal of this paper is to demonstrate the value of incorporating evaluation into the process of co-produced research in pursuit of climate services. We aim to spur interest in and expand the use of evaluation throughout the climate change and climate services scientific community, whether or not evaluation is a formally required component of funding. We use a case study from Southeast Alaska of the Ellam Yua co-production model implemented among a research center at a large public university and three leadership entities in a small remote community with a majority Alaska Native population. We describe our experiences with evaluation and share what we learned through the process of evaluation, specifically that local workforce development and healing from trauma were significant aspects of project success. This case study shows how important evaluation is for documenting, analyzing, and planning for multiple definitions of success and successfully implementing equitably co-produced research. It also underscores the significance of expanding typical conceptions of climate services to include a more holistic view of using Indigenous priorities and values to support local capacity-building and psychological benefits. Building generalized capacities locally to respond to climate-related stressors was a key part of climate services for our team. Only through Indigenous evaluation did the Kake Climate Partnership partners realize the full transformative potential of the Ellam Yua co-produced research process–to produce climate services and to uncover new understandings of what climate services can be for communities.

Small island communities are among the first and hardest impacted by sea-level rise, though climate initiatives often focus on more heavily populated and economically productive coastal cities. Furthermore, most climate-impact studies focus on regional scales that may be less applicable to small islands with locally unique morphodynamics. Little Cumberland Island, Georgia, located in southeastern USA, is one example of an often-overlooked small island community. The island is minimally developed; a single dock and dirt roads connect ∼40 homes. Residents report that tidal flooding of low-elevation roads has increased in frequency and magnitude over remembered history and is a primary concern for the longevity of island infrastructure. However, without site-specific flooding predictions, they are unsure how or when to develop the roads. Through community science, this study (a) quantified the impact of wind velocity on tidal flooding, (b) predicted future flooding due to sea-level rise, and (c) provided actionable results and advice to island residents. Superimposing predicted sea-level rise onto observed tidal elevations suggests that the frequency of high-tide flood events which inundate roads by at least 15 cm may nearly double by 2030 and nearly triple by 2040. We advise residents to develop flood-resilient elevated roads within the next decade. This community-driven project involved local knowledge, collective action, and social learning with external and internal expertise, though communal agreement on governance for resilient development would benefit from an alignment of conservation values and an extended period of time.

Community Science is an experiment. The premise is that centering on a broad range of disciplinary, and interdisciplinary, science called for, created, and conducted by teams of place-based community residents and professional scientists will positively push the boundaries of what we understand as science, from discoveries to solutions. In this pursuit, we define science broadly: natural science, both physical and living; social science; health science; and ingrained ways of knowing that have been emerging and evolving since time immemorial within Indigenous cultures. Community is similarly a term that signifies a wide range of publics engaged in a myriad of ways; from those who may engage in only a single activity, to those who are formative to the work, including those who span the boundaries between the worlds describing community and science. Just as we seek those on the creative edge as authors, we depend on those with deep experience in both the scientific discipline and the community, whatever form it may take, to serve as peer reviewers. Part of our publication experiment is to step back and ask the questions: who are “peers?” Can we expand the approachability and usefulness of published work beyond traditional scientific professionalism and disciplinary boundaries through thoughtful selection of reviewers who are more, and perhaps different, than the degree-credentialed professionals journal editors have traditionally turned to? And will these peers and near-peers have the ability to set aside time from their own work to bring community science to the forefront and participate in patient, positive, thoughtful reviews?

Agriculture is central to sustainable development both from provisioning and pressure perspectives. It is hence imperative to measure its diverse outcomes, for which various global indicator systems have been developed. Yet, these come with trade-offs, for example, between comparability among countries versus specificity to national context. This poses the question how relevant generic indicators are for national stakeholders and how specific information requirements can be integrated within a globally comparable assessment. Herein, we present the co-evaluation of an existing system of global agricultural sustainability indicators with national stakeholders from agricultural practice, research and education, public administration, private sector, and NGOs in Austria, representing an expert community. Focusing on the relevance of the indicators and the requirements for complementary metrics, we found that particularly social themes and related indicators were highly specific to the national context, followed by economic and environmental aspects. Co-interpretation of selected indicator trajectories showed that drivers and interactions were highly complex and may change over time, emphasizing also the importance of complementary contextual information. Yet, availability of data to measure indicators proposed by stakeholders remains a key limitation to the adaptation of the indicator system. We outline two options for improving the relevance of the global indicator system: (a) substituting less relevant indicators or (b) introducing a second tier covering regionally important aspects. To explore which of the two options is most appropriate across geographies and whether unified approaches to such a regionalization are indeed feasible, we propose to include the co-creation of regionalized indicator frameworks in future iterations across agriculturally diverse countries.