Available via license: CC BY 4.0
Content may be subject to copyright.
sustainability
Article
Taiwan Roadkill Observation Network: An Example
of a Community of Practice Contributing to
Taiwanese Environmental Literacy for Sustainability
Chia-Hsuan Hsu 1, Te-En Lin 2, Wei-Ta Fang 3and Chi-Chang Liu 1, *
1School of Forestry and Resource Conservation, National Taiwan University, Taipei City 106, Taiwan;
d05625002@ntu.edu.tw
2Endemic Species Research Institute, Council of Agriculture, Executive Yuan, Nantou County 552, Taiwan;
dnlin@tesri.gov.tw
3Graduate Institute of Environmental Education, National Taiwan Normal University, Taipei City 116,
Taiwan; wtfang@ntnu.edu.tw
*Correspondence: chichangliu@ntu.edu.tw
Received: 7 September 2018; Accepted: 5 October 2018; Published: 10 October 2018
Abstract:
Citizen science has become a major source of scientific research in recent years. Many
studies have concluded that citizen science projects not only contribute to the sciences but also
considerably improve the scientific and environmental literacy of participating volunteers (citizen
scientists). A dynamic citizen science project can accomplish goals that benefit society but it is
difficult to establish, operate, and maintain a citizen science project. This paper reports a case study
and examined the most famous citizen science project in Taiwan, the Taiwan Roadkill Observation
Network (TaiRON), with the viewpoint of a community of practice learning theory. Community of
practice theory is widely used in education and business management research and is an important
framework for knowledge exchange and dissemination. Through content analysis, observation, and
interviews with the moderator of the TaiRON project, this study explored how its internal operations
reflected the principles of community of practice theory. The results indicated that TaiRON members
developed a set of shared working methods and jointly completed certain actions. All participating
members possessed in-depth knowledge or enthusiasm with respect to their specific focus areas,
enabling them to meaningfully contribute to work on specific topics. The three major elements of a
community of practice—domain, community, and practice—should be aligned with the community’s
purpose and action. We discovered that the TaiRON citizen science project was consistent with the
elements of the theory of community of practice. In particular, the establishment of TaiRON was
enabled by scientific and technological advances; therefore, this paper discusses the characteristics of
virtual communities of practice. Moreover, TaiRON contributed to raising the public’s environmental
literacy. This paper reports pilot research concerning citizen science operations and may stimulate
related future research.
Keywords:
citizen science; communities of practice; environmental literacy; citizen scientist;
Taiwan Roadkill Observation Network
1. Introduction
Citizen science projects are one of the major recent trends in scientific research. By harnessing
the power of the public to perform large-scale collection of scientific data, citizen science presents an
effective approach to investigate, monitor, and conserve Ecology; examples include the monitoring
and removal of non-native species, conducting urban bird surveys, studying coral reef fish, and
astrology [
1
–
4
]. Taiwan is home to many citizen science projects, such as Breeding Bird Survey
Sustainability 2018,10, 3610; doi:10.3390/su10103610 www.mdpi.com/journal/sustainability
Sustainability 2018,10, 3610 2 of 14
Taiwan, Taiwan Amphibian Conservation, Airboxes, Terrestrial Snails in Taiwan, and Taiwan Roadkill
Observation Network (TaiRON).
In addition to contributing to scientific research, citizen science is a means to promote science
and environmental education [
5
–
7
]. Scientists and participants communicate and engage in field
research when working on a project together, which raises the scientific knowledge and science or
environmental literacy of the participants—citizen science projects present an attractive means for
scientists to connect with the public.
This paper examines TaiRON as a citizen science case study. The TaiRON project maintains
a simple record of roadkill incidents, which entails photographing and uploading pictures and
geographic locations of the roadkill to an internet database. It derives its scientific value from the
extensive collection of records it comprises. Since its founding on 8 August 2011, TaiRON’s membership
has grown to roughly 15,000 members. Its original ecological data collecting mission has expanded to
encompassing conservation activities that have achieved major success. TaiRON thus exemplifies a
successful citizen science project. For example, in 2013, a rabies case was discovered in Taiwan—the
first since 1961—and it caused considerable panic among the public. However, after examination of
Formosan ferret-badger (Melogale moschata) specimens collected by TaiRON over the years, it was
discovered that rabies had persisted in Taiwan in that species for years. The discovery of this vector of
a potential rabies epidemic prompted the government to give more attention to interspecies disease
transmission between humans and animals and to adopt certain policies in response. The vital role
played by TaiRON in monitoring for rabies to thwart an epidemic opened the eyes of major domestic
and foreign experts in epidemic prevention to the power and the value of the TaiRON citizen scientists.
Another case was in 2014, some citizen scientists discovered birds that died from unknown causes
near an agricultural area. In the following year, TaiRON cooperated with National Pingtung University
of Science and Technology and engaged citizen scientists to collect bird carcass. The volunteers
collected 250 bird corpses for laboratory tests, which confirmed that the bird deaths were attributable
to the pesticides used on crops. This prompted the Taiwanese government to restrict pesticides, and
the Bill of Pesticide Management amendment, establishing a pesticide control system, was passed
after the third reading in the Legislative Council. It included a one-year buffer period that expired on
26 December 2016. Since then, the 3500-odd pesticide stores across Taiwan have had their products
regulated under the law.
How TaiRON community operated is also interesting. The member started with 12 people in
2011 and increased to 14,873 recently (Figure 1). Thus, in our article, we try to discuss with a theory
“community of practice”. The theory of community of practice is discussed to a participation process
that is committed to a common area and formed by a group of learners is the core concept of community
of practice theory [
8
–
10
]. We hoped to know if participants of TaiRON follow the core elements of
community of practice, or how the new comers turned into the core members. We will review the
community of practice in detail in next section.
Sustainability 2018,10, 3610 3 of 14
Sustainability 2018, 10, x FOR PEER REVIEW 3 of 13
Figure 1. The evolution of the number of participants in time.
2. Literature Review
2.1. Citizen Science
Definitions of citizen science vary slightly by region. In America, citizen science is mainly led by
scientists and uses the power of volunteers to conduct large-scale standardized data collection [5]. In
Europe, citizen science has a more humanistic hue and typically concerns social science research,
which is undertaken to raise public awareness and knowledge, adopting a philosophy of science
approach to engage citizens in discussion and policy formulation [11]. Restated, one could say that
citizen science in America is typically science-oriented and involves data collection, analysis, and
cooperation with scientists whereas the typical European model views citizen science as a powerful
and engaged community for policy work. Judging from the collected projects featured on the
“Introduction to Citizen Science” website, the citizen science programs in Taiwan tends more toward
to the American view of citizen science; however, some community-based discussion groups and
groups that seek to reconstruct the traditional knowledge of indigenous tribes are also referred to as
citizen science in Taiwan. The present author contends that the most fruitful approach entails a
combination of these approaches. From an educator’s perspective, Krueger and Shannon (2000)
define citizen science as a process that enables a wide range of people to participate in scientific
research [12].
Because scientific research might be wide-ranging and large in scale, citizen science has become
one of the most vital paths for undertaking scientific research. It also offers participants the
opportunity for self-improvement and for contributing to society [13]. Citizen science generates
benefits for individuals and society. Citizen scientists can monitor ecological phenomenon [14,15]
and contribute to the removal of alien species [1,16], which benefits society. Participating in citizen
science can increase the critical-thinking skills of volunteers [17] and enhance their social capacity
[13], which are personal benefits. Because participants forge close connections with scientists during
onsite investigations and project implementation, a volunteer’s participation in the process of project
planning can enhance their scientific knowledge as well as scientific and environmental literacy [5,18–
20]. Participants are also empowered to influence policy [13,21]. The benefits of citizen science can be
classified into four categories (Table 1): benefits to the scientific community, benefits to volunteers,
benefits to the education community, and benefits to society.
Figure 1. The evolution of the number of participants in time.
TaiRON’s contributions to Taiwan’s environment and society are exemplified by the two cases
detailed in the preceding paragraphs. Having demonstrated the organization’s value, this paper next
addresses two questions:
(1)
Whether TaiRON’s operational model is essentially consistent with the theory of community of
practice, and
(2)
Whether, and to what extent, TaiRON has contributed to the dissemination of environmental
knowledge among its volunteers and the general public.
These questions will be discussed in the following paragraph.
2. Literature Review
2.1. Citizen Science
Definitions of citizen science vary slightly by region. In America, citizen science is mainly led
by scientists and uses the power of volunteers to conduct large-scale standardized data collection [5].
In Europe, citizen science has a more humanistic hue and typically concerns social science research,
which is undertaken to raise public awareness and knowledge, adopting a philosophy of science
approach to engage citizens in discussion and policy formulation [
11
]. Restated, one could say that
citizen science in America is typically science-oriented and involves data collection, analysis, and
cooperation with scientists whereas the typical European model views citizen science as a powerful and
engaged community for policy work. Judging from the collected projects featured on the “Introduction
to Citizen Science” website, the citizen science programs in Taiwan tends more toward to the American
view of citizen science; however, some community-based discussion groups and groups that seek to
reconstruct the traditional knowledge of indigenous tribes are also referred to as citizen science in
Taiwan. The present author contends that the most fruitful approach entails a combination of these
approaches. From an educator’s perspective, Krueger and Shannon (2000) define citizen science as a
process that enables a wide range of people to participate in scientific research [12].
Because scientific research might be wide-ranging and large in scale, citizen science has become
one of the most vital paths for undertaking scientific research. It also offers participants the opportunity
for self-improvement and for contributing to society [
13
]. Citizen science generates benefits for
Sustainability 2018,10, 3610 4 of 14
individuals and society. Citizen scientists can monitor ecological phenomenon [
14
,
15
] and contribute
to the removal of alien species [
1
,
16
], which benefits society. Participating in citizen science can increase
the critical-thinking skills of volunteers [
17
] and enhance their social capacity [
13
], which are personal
benefits. Because participants forge close connections with scientists during onsite investigations and
project implementation, a volunteer’s participation in the process of project planning can enhance
their scientific knowledge as well as scientific and environmental literacy [
5
,
18
–
20
]. Participants
are also empowered to influence policy [
13
,
21
]. The benefits of citizen science can be classified into
four categories (Table 1): benefits to the scientific community, benefits to volunteers, benefits to the
education community, and benefits to society.
Table 1. Four Levels of Effects from Citizen Science (adapted from Raddick et al., 2009) [13].
Beneficiary Benefits
Scientific Community
1. Quick collection of extensive data
2. Having an extensive body of data increases the likelihood of having collected
particularly germane information
3. Quick and accurate analysis of extensive data
4. Simulation parameters can be explored quickly
5. Occasional novel discoveries
Volunteers
1. Have fun
2. Connect with the society and community
3. Participate in real science
Education Community
1. Communication with scientists
2. Acquire more scientific knowledge
3. Experience scientific practice
4. Opportunity to change a scientific attitude
Society 1. Strengthens the relationship between scientists and the public
2. Improves scientific cognition of the general public
The learning process and outcome of participation in citizen science and how knowledge is
constructed and acquired from such participation has been less well studied [
17
]. Nevertheless,
the prominent roles of science and technology in society, increasing scientific literacy among the
general public, and heightened environmental awareness have caused increasing numbers of people
to care about the environment and recognize how Ecology influences their lives. The internet has
also facilitated friendship formation among individuals with interests in the same scientific topics.
Thus, citizen science has thrived on the basis of convenience of the internet. Despite the benefits to
individuals and society, most scientists are primarily concerned with the data collected by citizen
scientists rather than the citizen scientists themselves. The author assumes that this is attributable to
the much greater difficulty of analyzing data concerning human participants in citizen science than
in analyzing the hard data collected by those participants. However, understanding the participants
in citizen science is also worthwhile; therefore, this study explores the human side of citizen science,
including the operations of citizen science projects.
2.2. Community of Practice
The community of practice theory was proposed by Lave and Wenger in 1991. A participation
process that is committed to a common area and formed by a group of learners is the core concept of
community of practice theory [
8
–
10
]. Participating in a community of practice is an old phenomenon,
but acquiring knowledge and learning from participation are new aspects of the concept. Various forms
Sustainability 2018,10, 3610 5 of 14
of communities have always been organized within human societies to share practical experiences;
cave-dwelling ancestral tribes discussed hunting around the campfire, guild members discussed trade
in the middle ages, street gang members share techniques for living at the margins of society, and
engineering trade groups discuss the latest design principles—in all these examples, which are a
few illustrations of the myriad possible examples, the fundamental aspect of participation in the
community is learning [8].
The study of a citizen science “community” has rarely been undertaken. A citizen science
community requires a careful composition of various elements to be successful. A community of
practice entails an informal group in which members share issues of common concern, develop a shared
working style, and complete certain specific actions. The participating members have deep knowledge
of or enthusiasm for their specific issues, and these community members adopt various personal
roles and have various experiences. Members do not necessarily meet every day, but they typically
communicate in some form, such as via the Internet, because they find value in communicating with
each other. Communities of practice exist everywhere, and most citizens belong to at least one of them,
whether at school, in the family, at work, or through membership in an interest group [
22
]. Members
tend to learn the essentials of their work and activities through communities of practice, and the setup
is similar to an apprenticeship [
10
]. Although they have always existed within human communities,
communities of practice have become a topic of interest for research because research into “knowledge
management” is now undertaken much more systematically, and a community of practice can be
categorized within that research field. Knowledge is the basis for success in society today. Therefore,
engaging in strategic management of communities of practice is a practical method for knowledge
management; knowledge management treats knowledge as an asset and seeks to manage it similar to
other assets that are systematically managed in a corporation [
22
]. Wenger et al. (2002) identified three
core elements that comprise a community of practice:
1.
Domain: A domain of knowledge is a key component of a community of practice. Community
members must discuss the core values of their community; such as issues of concern,
organizational strategies, and the desired effect from community activities.
2.
Community: In pursuing a categorical interest, the development of the community must
be focused, organized, and nurtured. For example, community members should follow the
community’s guidelines, support the emotional development of community members, participate
in the community’s activities, or seek to deploy an operational method in a community to maintain
the community’s vitality and growth.
3.
Practice: To maintain its inclusion in the field of knowledge, the community must constantly
participate in or develop various relevant activities. Activities can help the community to
effectively acquire knowledge resources and inherit knowledge. Community members can learn
from their practice.
Although a community of practice is established to serve its specific purpose, Storck and Hill
(2000) contended that members of a community should enjoy autonomy, which affords all community
members the space for open discussion and group learning [
23
]. Because of the members, community
interaction, communication, and development become major mechanisms for the creation, sharing,
and dissemination of knowledge. The main implication of a community of practice is that it promotes
the sharing of knowledge—a major benefit to the community. Because communities of practice afford
the opportunity for members to connect with all other members, membership in the community
provides enough time and space to establish relationships with others, and the focus is on common
topics of interest; these factors generate the conditions that promote knowledge sharing [
24
]. This
knowledge sharing is noneconomic in nature; nevertheless, it is not only for personal interest but also
for sustaining and developing the community. Embedded knowledge in the community is seen as
owned by all members, maintained by the community, and available as the basis for discussion and
collaboration. Knowledge is the key asset of the community [25].
Sustainability 2018,10, 3610 6 of 14
Wenger et al. (1998) proposed a social theory of learning and outlined four main necessary
preconditions for integrated social participation [10]:
1. Humans are social—this is the core concept of this learning theory;
2. Knowledge is valuable for work and other tasks and activities;
3. People are motivated to seek knowledge to understand causes and participate in activities;
4. Ultimate meaning—our experiences and actions are the final outcome of learning.
Wenger et al. (1998) believed that the most critical aspect of learning is that people must learn
through social participation; participation is not simply “doing something” but also includes ascribing
meaning to explorations and participation in action [
10
]. Social learning theory integrates elements
concerning social participants and those concerning the process of learning knowledge; these elements
are described as follows:
1.
Meaning: How we understand whether the actions we undertake are valuable within the larger
context of our life and society.
2.
Practice: The sharing of history and social resources, structures, ideas, and the ability to continue
participating in joint actions.
3.
Community: An organization or business should define its goals, and members should buy-in to
those goals.
4.
Identity: Learning changes the individual, and we can examine how a personal history is created
and altered in the context of a community.
Many citizen science communities use virtual organization or community platforms to
communicate and engage in discussions because their members are spread over a large survey
area; a virtual platform is also more convenient and may incentivize scientists to participate in it [
26
].
This virtual setup is called a virtual community of practice or a mobile practice community [
27
,
28
].
Members of the virtual community interact on the internet or platforms such as discussion boards
or news communities [
27
,
29
], and in a mobile community of practice, participants use mobile
phones to communicate with the community or conduct work in the community. An online
community is more challenging for new members. Many participants in the online community
are not necessarily members of the physical community, and because participation in the community’s
activities is not on a fixed schedule, it becomes difficult to receive formal training. Wenger (2001)
undertook a community-oriented technology survey that revealed numerous online and virtual
practice communities and concluded that although the forms of these communities may vary, their
ultimate goal is to exchange knowledge through identifying and solving problems, establishing a
vision, and establishing a common knowledge base [28].
Another key concept in community of practice theory is legitimate peripheral participation. This
concept holds that in communities of practice, new members gradually move from the periphery to the
center of the community. This process begins with simple work; for example, a new member observes
the working practices of the experienced members of the community [
30
]. Lave and Wenger (1991)
argued that the knowledge and ability acquired specifically from participation in a community of
practice by learners have value and significance; if learners can take the initiative and learn community
knowledge, they will gain a deeper understanding of the acquired knowledge shared by the community
and their community’s culture [
30
]. Therefore, studying the learning process of new members of
citizen science communities also warrants research. How a member transitions from a peripheral
member to a core member and the various roles a member inhabits at various stages of integration in
the community during the transition are also worth discussing.
Community of practice theory has been widely used in research concerning corporate
communities, education communities, and hobby communities [
31
–
34
], but no practical community
study has been conducted concerning citizen science communities. Therefore, this study is a pilot
study that clarifies new perspectives and charts a path for subsequent research on citizen science
Sustainability 2018,10, 3610 7 of 14
projects. Besides, we also wanted to know how the citizen science projects raise the public through the
communities of practice.
3. Materials and Methods
3.1. Participation Observation
This study used participatory observation as one method of data collection. The authors conducted
most direct observations by participating in TaiRON’s online community, attending the annual meeting
and trainings, and interacting with core members. Because social phenomena are dynamic and social
actions and cultures vary according to person, time, place, and object, participatory observation is a
fundamental research method in the social sciences [
35
]. After analyzing and comparing the observed
data with community of practice theory, one TaiRON core member and one expert or scholar conducted
data tests to improve the validity of our conclusions. Participatory observation is a method through
which a researcher can get close to the research object. Researchers immerse themselves in the subjects
of research. Through participatory observation, a researcher comes to clearly understand the research
subject’s terminology, communication patterns, behaviors, and actions. However, something that
needs to be noticed about the method is that the validity of results from participatory observation
must be tested. This study used the analyst’s triangulation method to compensate for this deficiency.
3.2. Content Analysis
Data content analysis was another method used in this study. One of the authors of this study is
the moderator of TaiRON. He provided first-hand information regarding TaiRON, for example, its
organizational vision and architecture. In addition, TaiRON’s internal operating model was analyzed
through examination of TaiRON’s accumulated survey data, relevant reports of results, and information
appearing on the official website. Because TaiRON has made major contributions to Taiwanese society,
numerous interviews and reports concerning core members, the families of citizen scientists, and other
relevant topics have been conducted and were available for examination.
3.3. Unstructured Interviews
We conducted unstructured interviews with Mr. Lin. Mr. Lin is the moderator of TaiRON
now and also is a research assistant in the Endemic Species Center. He founded TaiRON and still
continues promoting the roadkill citizen science. The main interview content concerned the operation
and management of the entire citizen science community. After the interview, we converted the text
into a verbatim script and coded it according to the categories of communities of practice, legitimate
peripheral participation, and dissemination of knowledge. The interview was conducted on 26 March
2017. The series code would be (Mr. Lin, 26 March 2017).
4. Results
This study was a pilot study because community of practice theory has been developed in various
respects since 1991, but here, for the first time, we examined the core theory with respect to a citizen
science project (TaiRON).
4.1. Analyzing TaiRON in Light of the Four Principles of Social Theory of Learning
The four main elements of social learning theory are as follows: (1) humans are social; (2)
knowledge is valuable for work and other tasks and activities; (3) people are motivated to seek
knowledge to pursue careers and participate in activities; and (4) our experiences and actions are the
final outcome of learning and generate ultimate meaning.
The four preconditions and related observations from this study of TaiRON are displayed in
Table 2.
Sustainability 2018,10, 3610 8 of 14
Table 2. Four preconditions and related observations of this study.
Element of Community of Practice Theory Observation Concerning TaiRON
(1) Humans are social
TaiRON is a fully interactive community in which
members confer to identify dead species on roadside,
discuss ecological issues, and jointly participate in
conducting surveys.
(2) Knowledge is valuable for work and other tasks
and activities
The knowledge provided by each person is valuable;
for example, the species that each person specializes
in are not the same, and therefore a membership with
various specialties is of considerable value for
collectively determining the type of species that a
dead animal is.
(3) People are motivated to seek knowledge to pursue
careers and participate in activities
Members hope to learn to recognize species through
acquiring environmental knowledge by
communicating with each other, and this knowledge
can help members participate in the investigation.
(4) Experiences and actions are the final outcome of
learning from which we assemble the ultimate
meaning of our activities
* In addition to completing surveys, volunteers also
hope to see TaiRON contribute to policymaking.
Therefore, members are inspired to learn within the
community and constantly improve their abilities to
collect more accurate information. In addition to
enhancing their own abilities, members hope to
contribute to society.
We conclude that TaiRON meets the four preconditions of a community of practice.
The assemblage of knowledge is critical for the community because revealing the roadkill problems
depend on the information that is gathered from investigations and shared among the members.
Various members are experts in a wide variety of fields, and members can contribute to the group’s
collective knowledge of amphibians, reptiles, arthropods, mammals, birds, and the particular species’
within these groups. The carcass of dead animals at the roadside are often difficult to recognize. Thus,
citizen scientists must possess a broad base of knowledge to make identifications; however, if an animal
cannot be recognized, members can exchange knowledge through discussion to identify the species.
4.2. Three Core Elements of Community of Practice Theory and TaiRON
The three core elements of community of practice theory are domain, community, and practice.
Domain is an important aspect of a community of practice. Community members must discuss
the core values of their community. The aims of the community must be within the domain, and
the development of the community must be accordingly focused, organized, and nurtured. The
practice element highlights that a community must continually interact in the field of knowledge,
and a community must continue to participate in or develop various activities. Practice can help the
community effectively acquire knowledge resources and inherit knowledge. Community members
can also learn through practice (Table 3).
Sustainability 2018,10, 3610 9 of 14
Table 3. Core elements of community of practice theory and TaiRON’s vision.
Three Core Elements of the
Community of Practice Theory
Analysis of the Research Data
(Source: TaiRON’s Official Website)
Domain
1. Citizen science.
2. Improve identification of roadkill.
3. Environmental education.
4. Promote respect for wildlife.
Community
1. Members begin participate in the roadkill recording activity, implement
environmental education activities, and promote the concept of
ecological conservation.
2. Hold annual meetings and follow the related regulations.
Practice
1.
Propose ideas, experimental designs, data collection projects, engage in analytic
discussion, and participate in cooperative work.
2. Through analysis of a large set of data collected at a section of road with a
severe roadkill problem, TaiRON identified the most dangerous seasons and
threatened species, and advocated for an improved road design or the addition
of wildlife corridors, fences, or other facilities to reduce the considerable
number of dead wildlife killed because of the development of domestic roads
and traffic volume.
With respect to domain, TaiRON has four core values, which are shared by its members.
Participants are willing to invest time and effort to collect citizen science information related to
these four core values. Regarding community, TaiRON organizes several events each year to promote
the relationships between its members. For example, more than 200 people attended the 2014 TaiRON
annual meeting. They might not all meet one another, but events such as annual meetings give
members the opportunity to collectively communicate, discuss the knowledge in the community, and
attend topical seminars [
36
]. In addition, related rules are clearly established to govern members’
behavior. For example, it is forbidden to directly disclose the location of dead animals, especially rare
or endangered species in the community to prevent the appearance of opportunistic hunters. Practice
is evident in the implementation of the survey and the discussion of policy. Members can learn from
actual situations and convert the knowledge into practical actions. Mr. Lin commented:
“Participants can achieve a deeper level of communication when they engage in the citizen
science recording project. Then, during the discussion concerning the dead animals by
the roadside, if the participants share an opinion and we realize that is a good topic, we
responded to the commenting member after the discussion. In so doing, we satisfy their
desire to express their ideas and concepts.” (Mr. Lin, 26 March 2017)
4.3. Legitimate Peripheral Participation and TaiRON
The creation of a community is bound to involve newcomers, but how they transition from being
peripheral newcomers to core players or old timers is of interest for every community of practice. How
a member is converted into a core player typically depends on some contextual factors. For example,
the core role and who plays it may vary depending on the project and expertise of the members. We
can use some cases of TaiRON to prove that this phenomenon has occurred in the community.
The moderator of TaiRON described how newcomers join TaiRON:
“Participants discovered that there were so many animals near their homes that they had
never seen before and never would have seen but for participation in the organization. They
only saw the dead. Many people would reflect on this afterwards, and contemplate the
human activities that lead to roadkill. Subsequently, they became very involved, and they
Sustainability 2018,10, 3610 10 of 14
started looking for friends to join too. Slowly, the number of people in TaiRON increased.”
(Mr. Lin, 26 March 2017)
From this, we conclude that TaiRON has many legitimate peripheral participants, and new
participants are continually joining the organization. How they deepen their involvement is beyond
the scope of this study. However, we do know that many experts in various fields are active within
the community:
Mr. Lin stated, “the most interesting thing about citizen science is that many experts are
active in our community, and they offer their expertise and share ideas and suggestions
when we encounter problems.” (From the Reporter News, 27 December 2016)
Many members of TaiRON have various specialties. Therefore, when a problem related to any
academic specialty occurs, a member from within that professional community can step forward and
assist the organization at the appropriate times. For instance:
“Even members in the United States—in New York—provided suggestions and assistance
on an initiative to develop an app for us to use to maintain records.” [37]
Members who were originally peripheral participants were able to apply their expertise with
respect to this project to assist TaiRON and became core participants of this project.
From these experiences, it is evident that legitimate peripheral participation occurs in TaiRON.
However, this study observed that TaiRON’s legitimate peripheral participation may be more
complicated than typical of a community of practice. This is because the knowledge level encompassed
by the activities of TaiRON is very wide. Moreover, the talents across various professional fields in the
community are quite diverse; thus, the legitimate peripheral participants are in constant flux.
4.4. Improvement of Environmental Literacy for Sustainability
TaiRON’s citizen science community has contributed greatly to the dissemination of
environmental and scientific knowledge. However, it has not always gone smoothly.
“TaiRON has become widely known in Taiwan. Five years ago, if you mentioned the roadkill
group, no one would know what it was. Everyone would be very puzzled, and say things
like, why did you get into this kind of thing? People would think that it was a group of
freaks.” (Mr. Lin, 26 March 2017)
However, eventually, many newspapers and magazines began to report on TaiRON’s
contributions. Till now, TaiRON has been mentioned 271 times by social media such as Environmental
Information Newsletter, China Times, Taiwan Animal News, Apple Daily, The Reporter, ETtoday, etc.
Almost all the Taiwanese news were included. The frequency of the TaiRON’s news was approximately
50 times per year in recent 3 years. Besides, the TaiRON’s information sometimes presented in the
magazines regarding the nature or environmental education such as Nature Conservation Quarterly,
Green Teacher, and so on. A member of TaiRON, Ms. Chin, told her own experience to Mr. Lin:
“After joining TaiRON, everyone treated me as a pariah and blocked me out because they
would see pictures of dead animals on their Facebook feed. Many people were unnerved,
but later, they came to understand that concern for the death of these animals was not some
weird and horrific preoccupation—this realization was helpfully assisted by media reports of
our activities. People came to realize that the dead animals are a critical signal of a problem
in the environment, and that all our health could be endangered.” (Mr. Lin, 26 March 2017)
Thus, many people began to care about and pay attention to the matter of roadkill through
exposure to the work of TaiRON. Media attention also increased the awareness of many environmental
issues, and many people began to gradually pay attention to environmental issues because of news
Sustainability 2018,10, 3610 11 of 14
reports. In the past, concern for environmental issues typically did not extend past small groups of
environmentalists. But now, because of projects like TaiRON’s citizen science, concern is able to spread
out from core groups of concerned citizens to reach a broader segment of society.
“I think the roadkill group is quite different because it is addressing a problem across all the
species, and it involves diseases, pesticides, and safety issues. Everyone in the group has a
very special background. Most of the 10,000 people are not specialists in ecology or wildlife
biology, and largely come from a diverse variety of social strata.” (Mr. Lin, 26 March 2017)
The roadkill citizen science participants began to pay attention to the ecological environments
near their homes, and began to express concern whether engineering projects nearby were
ecologically friendly.
“Apart from joining a community of like-minded people, our members began to observe the
environment to determine if there were any problems near their own homes. For example, is
there a place where many trees were suddenly felled? After the felling, animals would have
no place to hide, so they would run out into the road and often be crushed to death. Or, if
there is a road that has a design problem that has become a major thoroughfare, then traffic
becomes very busy and hazardous to the animals.” (Mr. Lin, 26 March 2017)
We can conclude from these experiences that TaiRON has made an indelible contribution to
improving the environmental literacy of the general public.
5. Discussion
On the basis of the preliminary research of this study, we can conclude that the TaiRON citizen
science project is an example of a community of practice. In other studies, people rarely used
communities of practice to discuss the organization of a citizen science project. Citizen science
projects are often goal-oriented, and the domain of the communities of practice are the core values
of the project. Methods of communication, the sense of belonging among members, and the rules to
be followed are all part of the community. Practice mainly concerns how each citizen science project
conducts surveys and translates data into policies. According to the results of this study, it appears
that not only TaiRON but several citizen science communities are in line with the operating model
of a community of practice. The exchange of knowledge occupies the central position in each citizen
science project, informing both action and policy, and thus such projects can be understood through
the theoretical lens of community of practice.
The community was the main target of analysis in this study. Therefore, the “individual” members
of the community were left uninvestigated. Therefore, the individual’s activities within the community,
the role of legitimate peripheral participation, and other individual-based knowledge learning were not
explained in detail in this paper. However, the author’s future research is to examine the participants
in the community in light of the community of practice theory. In the future research, the author will
fill in the details missing from this paper to create a holistic view of how the individual and community
interact within a community of practice.
TaiRON’s website communities met many of the criteria proposed by Wenger (2001) such as:
member identification, asynchronous discussion boards, chat, instant messages, document folders,
calendar of events, administrative console, activity analysis, and management tools. In the current
generation, virtual communities of practice have become one of the main sites of knowledge exchange.
Therefore, research on virtual communities is also a subject worthy of discussion in the future.
Mr. Lin commented:
“All of a sudden, Facebook became popular, and some people began to rummage into their
cabinets to pull out slides and photos taken ten years ago, or two decades ago—as long as it
was road killed! Then, they uploaded it
. . .
. Anyway, Facebook is free. If it fails, we have no
loss or stress.” (Mr. Lin, 26 March 2017)
Sustainability 2018,10, 3610 12 of 14
The information age has had a very profound impact on TaiRON. Presently, most of Taiwan’s
citizen science projects have established virtual communities. Bonney et al. (2014) published an article
in the journal Science entitled “Next steps for citizen science” that concluded that more extensive, larger
scale, and more diverse data has been collected in recent years because of technology [
38
]. The trend
appears to be for citizen science to combine science and technology.
TaiRON has played a major role in improving public environmental literacy. It has managed to
widely disseminate environmental information to the people of Taiwan, which has increased public
awareness and sensitivity to environmental issues. These are the indispensable outcomes of all citizen
science projects: the promotion of public environmental literacy and the encouragement of more
sustainable development. However, a problem we are still trying to deal with is that only a small
population of participants contributed to most of the data in TaiRON (Figure 2). Ways to promote
people to engage our program would be our further study.
Sustainability 2018, 10, x FOR PEER REVIEW 11 of 13
that not only TaiRON but several citizen science communities are in line with the operating model of
a community of practice. The exchange of knowledge occupies the central position in each citizen
science project, informing both action and policy, and thus such projects can be understood through
the theoretical lens of community of practice.
The community was the main target of analysis in this study. Therefore, the “individual”
members of the community were left uninvestigated. Therefore, the individual’s activities within the
community, the role of legitimate peripheral participation, and other individual-based knowledge
learning were not explained in detail in this paper. However, the author’s future research is to
examine the participants in the community in light of the community of practice theory. In the future
research, the author will fill in the details missing from this paper to create a holistic view of how the
individual and community interact within a community of practice.
TaiRON’s website communities met many of the criteria proposed by Wenger (2001) such as:
member identification, asynchronous discussion boards, chat, instant messages, document folders,
calendar of events, administrative console, activity analysis, and management tools. In the current
generation, virtual communities of practice have become one of the main sites of knowledge
exchange. Therefore, research on virtual communities is also a subject worthy of discussion in the
future. Mr. Lin commented:
“All of a sudden, Facebook became popular, and some people began to rummage into their
cabinets to pull out slides and photos taken ten years ago, or two decades ago—as long as
it was road killed! Then, they uploaded it.... Anyway, Facebook is free. If it fails, we have
no loss or stress.” (Mr. Lin, 26 March 2017)
The information age has had a very profound impact on TaiRON. Presently, most of Taiwan’s
citizen science projects have established virtual communities. Bonney et al. (2014) published an article
in the journal Science entitled “Next steps for citizen science” that concluded that more extensive,
larger scale, and more diverse data has been collected in recent years because of technology [38]. The
trend appears to be for citizen science to combine science and technology.
TaiRON has played a major role in improving public environmental literacy. It has managed to
widely disseminate environmental information to the people of Taiwan, which has increased public
awareness and sensitivity to environmental issues. These are the indispensable outcomes of all citizen
science projects: the promotion of public environmental literacy and the encouragement of more
sustainable development. However, a problem we are still trying to deal with is that only a small
population of participants contributed to most of the data in TaiRON (Figure 2). Ways to promote
people to engage our program would be our further study.
Figure 2. The relationship of the participants and the roadkill data records.
Figure 2. The relationship of the participants and the roadkill data records.
Citizen science describes a multifaceted community. The term “citizen science” has only been
widely used in the last 30 years, which means that research concerning citizen science is still at a
nascent stage. Nevertheless, it appears that citizen science is an excellent tool for spreading knowledge
and promoting scientific and environmental literacy. Most vitally, citizen science has proven itself
capable of making an indelible contribution to society.
Author Contributions:
C.-H.H. and C.-C.L. conceived and designed the experiments; C.-H.H. and T.-E.L.
performed the experiments; C.-H.H., C.-C.L. and W.-T.F. analyzed the data; C.-H.H., C.-C.L., T.-E.L. and W.-T.F.
contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools; C.-H.H. and C.-C.L. wrote the paper.
Funding:
This research was funded by [Ministry of Science and Technology] grant number
(106-2511-S-002-012-MY2).
Acknowledgments:
We thank all of the TaiRON members who contribute the great effort to protect the
environment in Taiwan. This work was supported by grants from the Ministry of Science and Technology
(106-2511-S-002-012-MY2).
Conflicts of Interest: The authors declare no conflicts of interest.
Sustainability 2018,10, 3610 13 of 14
References
1.
Delaney, D.G.; Sperling, C.D.; Adams, C.S.; Leung, B. Marine invasive species: Validation of citizen science
and implications for national monitoring networks. Biol. Invasions 2008,10, 117–128. [CrossRef]
2.
Lintott, C.; Schawinski, K.; Bamford, S.; Slosar, A.; Land, K.; Thomas, D.; Edmondson, E.; Masters, K.;
Nichol, R.C.; Raddick, M.J.; et al. Galaxy Zoo 1: Data release of morphological classifications for nearly
900,000 galaxies. Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 2011,410, 166–178. [CrossRef]
3. McCaffrey, R.E. Using citizen science in urban bird studies. Urban Habitats 2005,3, 70–86.
4.
Pattengill-Semmens, C.V.; Semmens, B.X. Conservation and management applications of the reef volunteer
fish monitoring program. In Coastal Monitoring through Partnerships; Springer: Dordrecht, The Netherlands,
2003; pp. 43–50.
5.
Bonney, R.; Cooper, C.B.; Dickinson, J.; Kelling, S.; Phillips, T.; Rosenberg, K.V.; Shirk, J. Citizen science:
A developing tool for expanding science knowledge and scientific literacy. BioScience
2009
,59, 977–984.
[CrossRef]
6.
Krasny, M.E.; Bonney, R. Environmental education through citizen science and participatory action research.
In Environmental Education and Advocacy: Changing Perspectives of Ecology and Education; Cambridge University
Press: Cambridge, UK, 2005; pp. 292–320.
7.
Merenlender, A.M.; Crall, A.W.; Drill, S.; Prysby, M.; Ballard, H. Evaluating environmental education, citizen
science, and stewardship through naturalist programs. Conserv. Biol.
2016
,30, 1255–1265. [CrossRef]
[PubMed]
8.
Wenger, E. Communities of Practice: A Brief Introduction. 2011. Available online: http://www.ewenger.
com/theory/ (accessed on 20 July 2015).
9. Wenger, E. Communities of practice and social learning systems. Organization 2000,7, 225–246. [CrossRef]
10.
Wenger, E. Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning, and Identity; Cambridge University Press: Cambridge,
UK, 1998.
11.
Shirk, J.; Ballard, H.L.; Wilderman, C.C.; Phillips, T.; Wiggins, A.; Jordan, R.; McCallie, E.; Minarchek, M.;
Lewenstein, B.V.; Krasny, M.E.; et al. Public participation in scientific research: A framework for deliberate
design. Ecol. Soc. 2012,17. [CrossRef]
12.
Kruger, L.E.; Shannon, M.A. Getting to know ourselves and our places through participation in civic social
assessment. Soc. Nat. Res. 2000,13, 461–478. [CrossRef]
13.
Raddick, M.J.; Bracey, G.; Carney, K.; Gyuk, G.; Borne, K.; Wallin, J. Citizen science: Status and research
directions for the coming decade. AGB Stars Related Phenom. Astron. Astrophys. Decadal Surv.
2009
,2010, 46p.
14.
Conrad, C.C.; Hilchey, K.G. A review of citizen science and community-based environmental monitoring:
Issues and opportunities. Environ. Monit. Assess. 2011,176, 273–291. [CrossRef] [PubMed]
15.
Evans, C.; Abrams, E.; Reitsma, R.; Roux, K.; Salmonsen, L.; Marra, P.P. The Neighborhood Nestwatch
Program: Participant outcomes of a citizen-science ecological research project. Conserv. Biol.
2005
,19,
589–594. [CrossRef]
16.
Carballo-Cárdenas, E.C.; Tobi, H. Citizen science regarding invasive lionfish in Dutch Caribbean MPAs:
Drivers and barriers to participation. Ocean Coast. Manag. 2016,133, 114–127. [CrossRef]
17.
Trumbull, D.J.; Bonney, R.; Bascom, D.; Cabral, A. Thinking scientifically during participation in a
citizen-science project. Sci. Educ. 2000,84, 265–275. [CrossRef]
18.
Council, N.R. Learning Science in Informal Environments: People, Places, and Pursuits; National Academies
Press: Washington, DC, USA, 2009.
19.
Crall, A.W.; Jordan, R.; Holfelder, K.; Newman, G.J.; Graham, J.; Waller, D.M. The impacts of an
invasive species citizen science training program on participant attitudes, behavior, and science literacy.
Public Underst. Sci. 2013,22, 745–764. [CrossRef] [PubMed]
20.
Toomey, A.H.; Domroese, M.C. Can citizen science lead to positive conservation attitudes and behaviors?
Hum. Ecol. Rev. 2013,20, 50–62.
21.
Bäckstrand, K. Civic science for sustainability: Reframing the role of experts, policy-makers and citizens in
environmental governance. Glob. Environ. Polit. 2003,3, 24–41. [CrossRef]
22.
Wenger, E.; McDermott, R.A.; Snyder, W. Cultivating Communities of Practice: A Guide to Managing Knowledge;
Harvard Business Press: Brighton, MA, USA, 2002.
Sustainability 2018,10, 3610 14 of 14
23.
Storck, J.; Hill, P.A. Knowledge diffusion through “strategic communities”. Knowl. Commun.
2000
, 65–83.
[CrossRef]
24.
Lesser, E.L.; Storck, J. Communities of practice and organizational performance. IBM Syst. J.
2001
,40,
831–841. [CrossRef]
25.
Wasko, M.M.; Faraj, S. “It is what one does”: Why people participate and help others in electronic
communities of practice. J. Strateg. Inf. Syst. 2000,9, 155–173. [CrossRef]
26. Hey, T.; Trefethen, A.E. Cyberinfrastructure for e-Science. Science 2005,308, 817–821. [CrossRef] [PubMed]
27.
Dubé, L.; Bourhis, A.; Jacob, R. The impact of structuring characteristics on the launching of virtual
communities of practice. J. Organ. Chang. Manag. 2005,18, 145–166. [CrossRef]
28.
Wenger, E. Supporting communities of practice. A survey of community-oriented technologies. Draft
2001
.
[CrossRef]
29.
Dubé, L.; Bourhis, A.; Jacob, R.; Koohang, A. Towards a typology of virtual communities of practice.
Interdisciplin. J. Inf. Knowl. Manag. 2006,1. [CrossRef]
30.
Lave, J.; Wenger, E. Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation; Cambridge University Press:
Cambridge, UK, 1991.
31.
Bathmaker, A.M.; Avis, J. Becoming a lecturer in further education in England: The construction of
professional identity and the role of communities of practice. J. Educ. Teach. 2005,31, 47–62. [CrossRef]
32.
Hemphill, D.; Leskowitz, S. DIY activists: Communities of practice, cultural dialogism, and radical
knowledge sharing. Adult Educ. Q. 2013,63, 57–77. [CrossRef]
33.
Murillo, E. Communities of practice in the business and organization studies literature. Inf. Res.
2011
,16, 16.
34.
Van der Horst, D. Social enterprise and renewable energy: Emerging initiatives and communities of practice.
Soc. Enterp. J. 2008,4, 171–185. [CrossRef]
35.
Tedlock, B. From participant observation to the observation of participation: The emergence of narrative
ethnography. J. Anthropol. Res. 1991,47, 69–94. [CrossRef]
36. Lin, T.-E. The Workshop of Road Ecology and the 2nd Annual Meeting of Roadkill Group. Nat. Conserv. Q.
2014,86, 81–83. [CrossRef]
37.
Lin, T.-E.; Li, J.-J.; Yao, C.-T.; Chen, C.-Y.; Chen, Y.-K.; Hsu, C.-H.; Deng, D.-P. A Brief Introduction to Taiwan
Roadkill Observation Network. Nat. Conserv. Q. 2015, 26–33. [CrossRef]
38.
Bonney, R.; Shirk, J.L.; Phillips, T.B.; Wiggins, A.; Ballard, H.L.; Miller-Rushing, A.J.; Parrish, J.K. Next steps
for citizen science. Science 2014,343, 1436–1437. [CrossRef] [PubMed]
©
2018 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access
article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution
(CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
