We describe an online citizen science platform (www.mindhive.science) for human brain and behavior research that uses a participatory science learning approach to engage learners in the full spectrum of scientific inquiry. Building on an open science philosophy, it features a collaborative study design environment comprising an experiment builder, a database of validated tasks and surveys, and a public-facing study page; a peer review center where students are able to engage with and reflect on studies designed by peers from their own schools and schools around the globe; and GDPR-compliant data collection, data management, and data visualization and interpretation functionality. We describe student-initiated research generated during the COVID-19 pandemic to illustrate how the platform supports student-teacher-scientist community partnerships for participatory learning in authentic inquiry.
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Open science in the classroom: Students designing and peer reviewing studies in human brain and behavior research
Citizen science programs offer opportunities for K-12 students to engage in authentic science inquiry. However, these programs often fall short of including learners as agents in the entire process, and thus contrast with the growing open science movement within scientific communities. Notably, study ideation and peer review, which are central to the making of science, are typically reserved for professional scientists. This study describes the implementation of an open science curriculum that engages high school students in a full cycle of scientific inquiry. We explored the focus and quality of students’ study designs and peer reviews, and their perceptions of open science based on their participation in the program. Specifically, we implemented a human brain and behavior citizen science unit in 6 classrooms across 3 high schools. After learning about open science and citizen science, students (N = 104) participated in scientist-initiated research studies, and then collaboratively proposed their own studies to investigate personally interesting questions about human behavior and the brain. Students then peer reviewed proposals of students from other schools. Based on a qualitative and quantitative analysis of students’ artifacts created in-unit and on a pre and posttest, we describe their interests, abilities, and self-reported experiences with study design and peer review. Our findings suggest that participation in open science in a human brain and behavior research context can engage students with critical aspects of experiment design, as well as with issues that are unique to human subjects research, such as research ethics. Meanwhile, the quality of students’ study designs and reviews changed in notable, but mixed, ways: While students improved in justifying the importance of research studies, they did not improve in their abilities to align methods to their research questions. In terms of peer review, students generally reported that their peers' feedback was helpful, but our analysis showed that student reviewers struggled to articulate concrete recommendations for improvement. In light of these findings, we discuss the need for curricula that support the development of research and review abilities by building on students’ interests, while also guiding students in transferring these abilities across a range of research foci.
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- NSF-PAR ID:
- 10437089
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Instructional science
- ISSN:
- 0020-4277
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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MindHive is an online, open science, citizen science platform co-designed by a team of educational researchers, teachers, cognitive and social scientists, UX researchers, community organizers, and software developers to support real-world brain and behavior research for (a) high school students and teachers who seek authentic STEM research experiences, (b) neuroscientists and cognitive/social psychologists who seek to address their research questions outside of the lab, and (c) community-based organizations who seek to conduct grassroots, science-based research for policy change. In the high school classroom, students engage with lessons and studies created by cognitive and social neuroscientists, provide peer feedback on studies designed by students within a network of schools across the country, and develop and carry out their own online citizen science studies. By guiding them through both discovery (student-as-participant) and creation (student-as-scientist) stages of citizen science inquiry, MindHive aims to help learners and communities both inside and beyond the classroom to contextualize their own cognition and social behavior within population-wide patterns; to formulate generalizable and testable research questions; and to derive implications from findings and translate these into personal and social action.more » « less
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Human brain and behavior research has traditionally—and paradoxically—taken place mostly in environments that are isolated from the public: In a typical human neuroscience study, scientists recruit university students to participate in well-controlled laboratory studies, i.e., outside of humans’ natural habitat. This model is currently under attack from multiple directions, ranging from scholars arguing that it generates biased data, to communities who express distrust toward scientists, to educators who are eager for more authentic science experiences for their students. While a growing number of researchers is turning to citizen science approaches to both educate and involve the general public in science, these initiatives are most pervasive in the ‘traditional’ sciences (e.g., ecology, astronomy), and often focus on recruiting the public to help collect data, rather than including non-scientists as partners in their scientific process. MindHive (www.mindhive.science) is an online community science platform for human brain and behavior research that engages its users in the full spectrum of scientific inquiry. Taking an open science approach, MindHive features a collaborative study design environment, comprising an experiment builder, a database of validated tasks and surveys, and a public-facing study page; a peer review center; and GDPR-compliant data collection, data management, and data visualization and interpretation functionality. We describe case studies from the COVID-19 pandemic to illustrate how MindHive envisions enabling scientists, students, educators, not-for-profit organizations, and community members globally to contribute studies, resources, and research data to the platform, as such supporting both STEM learning and scientific discovery.more » « less
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Abstract Citizen science is personal. Participation is contingent on the citizens’ connection to a topic or to interpersonal relationships meaningful to them. But from the peer-reviewed literature, scientists appear to have an acquisitive data-centered relationship with citizens. This has spurred ethical and pragmatic criticisms of extractive relationships with citizen scientists. We suggest five practical steps to shift citizen-science research from extractive to relational, reorienting the research process and providing reciprocal benefits to researchers and citizen scientists. By virtue of their interests and experience within their local environments, citizen scientists have expertise that, if engaged, can improve research methods and product design decisions. To boost the value of scientific outputs to society and participants, citizen-science research teams should rethink how they engage and value volunteers.
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Graduate students emerging from STEM programs face inequitable professional landscapes in which their ability to practice inclusive and effective science communication with interdisciplinary and public audiences is essential to their success. Yet these students are rarely offered the opportunity to learn and practice inclusive science communication in their graduate programs. Moreover, minoritized students rarely have the opportunity to validate their experiences among peers and develop professional sensibilities through research training. In this article, the authors offer the Science Communication (Sci/Comm) Scholar’s working group at The University of Texas at San Antonio as one model for training graduate students in human dimensions and inclusive science communication for effective public engagement in thesis projects and beyond. The faculty facilitated peer-to-peer working group encouraged participation by women who often face inequities in STEM workplaces. Early results indicate that team-based training in both the science and art of public engagement provides critical exposure to help students understand the methodological care needed for human dimensions research, and to facilitate narrative-based citizen science engagements. The authors demonstrate this through several brief profiles of environmental science graduate students’ thesis projects. Each case emphasizes the importance of research design for public engagement via quantitative surveys and narrative-based science communication interventions. Through a faculty facilitated peer-to-peer working group framework, research design and methodological care function as an integration point for social scientific and rhetorical training for inclusive science communication with diverse audiences.more » « less
- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
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Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.1007/s11251-023-09633-9
