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Recruiting Messages Matter: Message Strategies to Attract Citizen Scientists

Authors:

Tae Kyoung Lee,

Kevin Crowston,

Carsten Østerlund,

Grant MillerAuthors Info & Claims

CSCW '17 Companion: Companion of the 2017 ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing

Pages 227 - 230

https://doi.org/10.1145/3022198.3026335

Published: 25 February 2017 Publication History

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Abstract

Although participation of citizen scientists is critical for a success of citizen science projects (a distinctive form of crowdsourcing), little attention has been paid to what types of messages can effectively recruit citizen scientists. Derived from previous studies on citizen scientists' motivations, we created and sent participants one of four recruiting messages for a new project, Gravity Spy, appealing to different motivations (i.e., learning about science, social proof, contribution to science, and altruism). Counter to earlier studies on motivation, our results showed that messages appealing to learning, contribution and social proof were more effective than a message appealing to altruism. We discuss the inconsistency between the present and prior study results and plans for future work.

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Cited By

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Lukyanenko RParsons J(2019)Beyond Micro-TasksCrowdsourcing10.4018/978-1-5225-8362-2.ch076(1510-1535)Online publication date: 2019
https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-5225-8362-2.ch076
Lukyanenko RParsons J(2019)Beyond Micro-TasksSocial Entrepreneurship10.4018/978-1-5225-8182-6.ch072(1403-1428)Online publication date: 2019
https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-5225-8182-6.ch072
(2019)Empowering Community Water Data StakeholdersInteracting with Computers10.1093/iwcomp/iwz032Online publication date: 26-Nov-2019
https://doi.org/10.1093/iwcomp/iwz032
Show More Cited By

Index Terms

Recruiting Messages Matter: Message Strategies to Attract Citizen Scientists
1. Human-centered computing
  1. Collaborative and social computing

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Information & Contributors

Information

Published In

CSCW '17 Companion: Companion of the 2017 ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing

February 2017

472 pages

ISBN:9781450346887

DOI:10.1145/3022198

General Chairs:
Charlotte P. Lee
University of Washington
,
Steve Poltrock
Retired
,
Program Chairs:
Louise Barkhuus
Stockholm University and Cornell Tech
,
Marcos Borges
Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro
,
Wendy Kellogg
IBM T.J. Watson Research Center

Permission to make digital or hard copies of part or all of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for third-party components of this work must be honored. For all other uses, contact the Owner/Author.

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Association for Computing Machinery

New York, NY, United States

Publication History

Published: 25 February 2017

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Funding Sources

National Science Foundation

Conference

CSCW '17

Sponsor:

SIGCHI

CSCW '17: Computer Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing

February 25 - March 1, 2017

Oregon, Portland, USA

Acceptance Rates

CSCW '17 Companion Paper Acceptance Rate 183 of 530 submissions, 35%;

Overall Acceptance Rate 2,235 of 8,521 submissions, 26%

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CSCW '25

Sponsor:
sigchi

Computer-Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing

October 18 - 22, 2025

Bergen , Norway

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Cited By

View all

Lukyanenko RParsons J(2019)Beyond Micro-TasksCrowdsourcing10.4018/978-1-5225-8362-2.ch076(1510-1535)Online publication date: 2019
https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-5225-8362-2.ch076
Lukyanenko RParsons J(2019)Beyond Micro-TasksSocial Entrepreneurship10.4018/978-1-5225-8182-6.ch072(1403-1428)Online publication date: 2019
https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-5225-8182-6.ch072
(2019)Empowering Community Water Data StakeholdersInteracting with Computers10.1093/iwcomp/iwz032Online publication date: 26-Nov-2019
https://doi.org/10.1093/iwcomp/iwz032
Preece JPauw DClegg T(2019)Interaction design of community-driven environmental projects (CDEPs): A case study from the Anacostia WatershedProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences10.1073/pnas.1808635115116:6(1886-1893)Online publication date: 5-Feb-2019
https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1808635115
Lukyanenko RParsons J(2018)Beyond Micro-TasksJournal of Database Management10.4018/JDM.201801010129:1(1-22)Online publication date: Jan-2018
https://doi.org/10.4018/JDM.2018010101
Chupin L(2018)L'informatisation participative d'herbiers comme dispositif de médiation du patrimoine et de la culture scientifique. Quelles convergences avec les dispositifs de formation à la médiation ?Tréma10.4000/trema.3954(119-131)Online publication date: 19-Jun-2018
https://doi.org/10.4000/trema.3954
Luna SGold MAlbert ACeccaroni LClaramunt BDanylo OHaklay MKottmann RKyba CPiera JRadicchi ASchade SSturm U(2018)Developing Mobile Applications for Environmental and Biodiversity Citizen Science: Considerations and RecommendationsMultimedia Tools and Applications for Environmental & Biodiversity Informatics10.1007/978-3-319-76445-0_2(9-30)Online publication date: 20-Jun-2018
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-76445-0_2

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