New Herpetofaunal Records from the Kingdom of Bhutan Obtained through Citizen Science

Abstract

Social media has, in the past decade, emerged unexpectedly as a powerful tool in citizen science (Liberatore et al. 2018). Whether unintended or formally integrated, it offers, among other benefits, mass participation in activities such as data collection in inventories, monitoring, or natural history observations (Tulloch 2013). It can be argued that such activities often do not consume taxpayers’ contributions, as formal research projects tend to do, and can provide a cost-effective means of data collection (Goldstien et al. 2014). The vast number of (and rapidly rising) online resources and virtual specialists available to identify samples serve as references and reviewers of such data, increasing the speed over traditional forms of data collection (e.g., scientific publishing) and providing the capacity to absorb multiple opinions. Nonetheless, challenges that remain in citizen science programs are directing the data towards priority scientific objectives and needs, and achieving high standards in data quality (Ambrose-Oji et al. 2014).