IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v11y2019i14p3918-d249496.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Can Short-Term Citizen Science Training Increase Knowledge, Improve Attitudes, and Change Behavior to Protect Land Crabs?

Author

Listed:
  • Chia-Hsuan Hsu

    (School of Forestry and Resource Conservation, National Taiwan University, Taipei 10617, Taiwan)

  • Yuan-Mou Chang

    (Department of Ecology and Environmental Resources, National University of Tainan, Tainan 70167, Taiwan)

  • Chi-Chang Liu

    (School of Forestry and Resource Conservation, National Taiwan University, Taipei 10617, Taiwan)

Abstract

Citizen science projects are considered popular and efficient approaches to scientific research and conservation of sustainability. In addition, much research suggests that citizen science can improve participants’ environmental and scientific literacy when they participate in surveys over a period of time. However, considerable research indicates that people in short-term training programs do not change their environmental literacy significantly. Nevertheless, studies have stated that these results might result from inappropriate evaluation methods. In this study, we used personal meaning mapping (PMM) to evaluate participants’ knowledge, attitude, and behavior intention in relation to land crab protection. This method merges quantitative and qualitative dimensions, used in scientific knowledge research, which we extend to evaluate attitude and behavior intention. As a result, even with short-term training, we observe that participants’ knowledge, attitude, and behavior intention significantly improves. Although some individuals exhibit no change in certain respects, we use PMM to understand the causes in detail. Taiwan is an island, famous for its fertile landscapes and biodiversity, and we anticipate finding efficient means to improve public environmental literacy. According to our research, public engagement in citizen science projects is an excellent approach to environmental education and conservation for sustainability.

Suggested Citation

  • Chia-Hsuan Hsu & Yuan-Mou Chang & Chi-Chang Liu, 2019. "Can Short-Term Citizen Science Training Increase Knowledge, Improve Attitudes, and Change Behavior to Protect Land Crabs?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(14), pages 1-15, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:11:y:2019:i:14:p:3918-:d:249496
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/14/3918/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/14/3918/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Chia-Hsuan Hsu & Te-En Lin & Wei-Ta Fang & Chi-Chang Liu, 2018. "Taiwan Roadkill Observation Network: An Example of a Community of Practice Contributing to Taiwanese Environmental Literacy for Sustainability," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(10), pages 1-14, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Daniela De Filippo & María Luisa Lascurain & Andres Pandiella-Dominique & Elias Sanz-Casado, 2020. "Scientometric Analysis of Research in Energy Efficiency and Citizen Science through Projects and Publications," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(12), pages 1-25, June.
    2. Shan-Hui Chao & Jin-Zhang Jiang & Kuan-Chu Wei & Eric Ng & Chia-Hsuan Hsu & Yi-Te Chiang & Wei-Ta Fang, 2021. "Understanding Pro-Environmental Behavior of Citizen Science: An Exploratory Study of the Bird Survey in Taoyuan’s Farm Ponds Project," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(9), pages 1-24, May.
    3. Chia-Hsuan Hsu, 2021. "Environmental Education: Revealing Some Current Problems from Personal Opinion," Technium Social Sciences Journal, Technium Science, vol. 22(1), pages 113-116, August.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Chia-Hsuan Hsu, 2021. "Environmental Education: Revealing Some Current Problems from Personal Opinion," Technium Social Sciences Journal, Technium Science, vol. 22(1), pages 113-116, August.
    2. Shan-Hui Chao & Jin-Zhang Jiang & Kuan-Chu Wei & Eric Ng & Chia-Hsuan Hsu & Yi-Te Chiang & Wei-Ta Fang, 2021. "Understanding Pro-Environmental Behavior of Citizen Science: An Exploratory Study of the Bird Survey in Taoyuan’s Farm Ponds Project," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(9), pages 1-24, May.
    3. Daniela De Filippo & María Luisa Lascurain & Andres Pandiella-Dominique & Elias Sanz-Casado, 2020. "Scientometric Analysis of Research in Energy Efficiency and Citizen Science through Projects and Publications," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(12), pages 1-25, June.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:11:y:2019:i:14:p:3918-:d:249496. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.