Meeting volunteer expectations — a review of volunteer motivations in citizen science and best practices for their retention through implementation of functional features in CS tools

Abstract

Citizen Science (CS) projects vary greatly. The aims and goals of a CS project determine the type of citizen involvement and the tools to be used, which in most cases also entail information and communication technology (ICT) that facilitates public participation in scientific research. Resource limitations in CS projects often require adopting suboptimal tools, which, however, may come with hidden costs stemming from poor usability and underwhelming functionality, thus reducing volunteers’ motivation. Meeting the volunteers’ expectations by designing or using existing tools with functional features which fulfill and nurture their motivations, will foster long-term participation and contribute to project sustainability. This paper reviews the types of CS projects, volunteer motivation and retention strategies from the literature and classifies them thematically. This is distilled into guidance that can help CS practitioners to design and implement CS tools and plan and manage CS projects, which better serve their scientific and volunteer-related goals.