Extreme Citizen Science

How can citizen science reduce psychological distance to science? Insights from three projects in contested environmental contexts

Citizen science (CS) is a participatory mode of knowledge production, enabling non-scientific actors to contribute to and sometimes contest scientific agendas and interpretations, making it a way to bridge science and society. This paper examines how that potential unfolds by analysing the individual perspectives of citizen scientists through the lens of Psychological Distance to Science (PSYDISC). Drawing on three case studies of contested environmental CS, we identify which contextual aspects of CS shape citizen scientists' experiences of social, spatial, temporal, or hypothetical distance to relevant science, and how these experiences may relate to trust. Our findings underscore the role of science communication as both a channel for dissemination, and as a constitutive element of participatory research; crucial for reducing psychological distance and enabling socially robust knowledge production, especially in contested, policy-relevant science settings.

Brandon Yates on Twitter / X

I wrote a cosmology paper that's under peer review.I can't post it to arXiv because I don't have a university affiliation.If any of you happen to have published in astro-ph. CO, gr-qc, or hep-ph and can endorse me, I'd owe you one.#AcademicTwitter #PhysicsTwitter #Cosmology…— Brandon Yates (@bmichaelyates) March 13, 2026