Citizen science, accessibility, art & science, critical thinking, policy and engagement: thoughts and lessons learned from the REINFORCE experience
Abstract REINFORCE (Research Infrastructures FOR Citizens in Europe) is a Research & Innovation Project, supported by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 SwafS, ‘Science with and for Society’ work programme (GA872859). The project, which ran from December, 2019, to November, 2022, engaged the public in a variety of innovative ways. Four citizen-science demonstrator projects were developed on the world-leading Zooniverse platform, each focussing on a different area of frontier physics: gravitational waves; neutrino astronomy; particle physics; and muography. A range of art and science events were launched and undertaken. A data-sonification tool— sonoUno —was developed in order to improve the accessibility of the data used in the four demonstrator projects. A course on critical thinking and a history of the Second Scientific Revolution was provided on YouTube and in podcast form, while a senior-citizen-science course was designed, co-developed and implemented. These initiatives were supported by a detailed engagement plan, a dedicated communications and dissemination strategy, and a constantly evolving assessment and evaluation approach. The experiences garnered during the project, in conjunction with consultations with project participants, volunteers and stakeholders, were built into the form of a policy roadmap explaining how to integrate citizen science into research infrastructures in Europe. The roadmap identifies a series of policy objectives and related policy gaps, associated challenges and lays out a series of recommendations. This article describes the results of the REINFORCE project and draws together the experiences of each of the involved twelve partner organisations.
Authors
- G. de Wasseige (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1010-5100)
- Francesca Spagnuolo (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7162-4900)
- G. Hemming (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5268-4465)
- Enzo Oukacha
- James F. Pearson (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8555-8561)
- Vincenzo Napolano (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0005-6468-1006)
- Francesco Mureddu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3268-334X)
- M. Razzano (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4825-1629)
- P. Coyle (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1615-1957)
- Maria Panagopoulou (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6524-823X)
- Theodore Avgitas (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3094-8946)
- Sofoklis Alexander Sotiriou (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8909-5963)
- S. Angelidakis (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8274-6118)
- Francesco Osimanti (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4121-0042)
- Claudia Fabian (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8869-5841)
- S. Serjeant (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0517-7943)
- F. Fidecaro (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6189-3311)
- J. Marteau (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1941-6842)
- Johanna Casado (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9528-5034)
- Elisabeth Unterfrauner (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1656-1932)
- Stylianos Vourakis
- B. Garćıa (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0919-2734)
- C. Kourkoumelis (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0083-274X)
- F. Di Renzo (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5447-3810)
- Emmanouil Chaniotakis (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8437-8251)
- Dimitrios Fassouliotis
- R. Le Breton (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9209-8460)
Institutions
- Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1 (FR)
- University of Pisa (IT)
- Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (FR)
- National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (GR)
- The Open University (GB)
- Université Paris Cité (FR)
- Commissariat à l'Énergie Atomique et aux Énergies Alternatives (FR)
- Université Paris-Saclay (FR)
- European Research Council (BE)
- Laboratoire AstroParticule et Cosmologie (FR)
- Centre de physique des particules de Marseille (FR)
- Institute of Accelerating Systems and Applications (GR)
- Ellinogermaniki Agogi (GR)
- CEA Paris-Saclay (FR)
- Education Trust (US)
- Instituto de Tecnologías en Detección y Astropartículas (AR)
- Centre for Social Innovation (AT)
- Institute of Nuclear Physics of Lyon (FR)
- Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare, Sezione di Pisa (IT)
- European Gravitational Observatory (IT)
- Institut de Recherche sur les Lois Fondamentales de l'Univers (FR)
- Institut de Physique des 2 Infinis de Lyon (FR)
- UCLouvain (BE)
Publication Details
- Journal
- The European Physical Journal Plus
- Published
- 2024-10-02
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1140/epjp/s13360-024-05313-w
- Citations
- 3
- Primary Topic
- Radio, Podcasts, and Digital Media
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 2.87
Funders
- European Commission
- Università di Pisa
- Horizon 2020 Framework Programme
- H2020 Science with and for Society