RT Journal Article
T1 Strengths and Challenges of Using iNaturalist in Plant Research with Focus on Data Quality
A1 López-Guillén, Eduard
A1 Herrera, Ileana
A1 Bensid, Badis
A1 Gómez-Bellver, Carlos
A1 Ibáñez, Neus
A1 Jiménez-Mejías, Pedro
A1 Mairal Pisa, Mario José
A1 Mena-García, Laura
A1 Nualart, Neus
A1 Utjés-Mascó, Mònica
A1 López-Pujol, Jordi
AB iNaturalist defines itself as an “online social network of people sharing biodiversity information to help each other learn about nature” and it is likely one of the largest citizen science web portals in the world, as every year millions of observations across thousands of species are gathered and collectively compiled by an engaged community of nearly 3 million users (November 2023). The strengths and potentialities that explain the success of the platform are reviewed and include, among others, its usability and low technical requirements, immediacy, open-access, the possibility of interacting with other users, artificial-intelligence-aided identification, versatility and automatic incorporation of the validated records to GBIF. iNaturalist has, however, features that scientists need to carefully consider when using it for their research, making sure that the quality of observations does not limit or hinder its usefulness in plant research. While these are identified (e.g., the lack of representative photographs for many observations or the relatively frequent identification errors), we provide some suggestions to overcome them and, by doing so, improve the use and add value to iNaturalist for plant research.
SN 1424-2818
YR 2024
FD 2024
LK https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14352/96527
UL https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14352/96527
LA eng
NO López-Guillén, E.; Herrera, I.; Bensid, B.; Gómez-Bellver, C.; Ibáñez, N.; Jiménez-Mejías, P.; Mairal, M.; Mena-García, L.; Nualart, N.; Utjés-Mascó, M.; et al. Strengths and Challenges of Using iNaturalist in Plant Research with Focus on Data Quality. Diversity 2024, 16, 42. https://doi.org/10.3390/d16010042
DS Docta Complutense
RD 22 jul 2024