Improving Methods of Participatory Soil Science through Interdisciplinary and International Collaboration

受污染的土壤威胁着世界各地社区的环境和人类健康，但土壤污染并不是许多公共卫生干预措施的重点，在土壤中遇到重金属的人很少意识到它们的存在或它们可能造成的危害。这个项目用“公民科学”的方法来研究土壤，重点是城市土壤。公民科学使公众参与科学研究；在这种情况下，测试土壤重金属污染物，探索污染源，并设想保护公众健康的战略。许多公民科学项目的一个缺点是，它们试图重现一个研究主题的狭窄学科方法，而不是努力解决人们与环境相互作用的多方面方式。相比之下，该项目组建了一个多学科团队，包括社会学家、化学工程师、环境科学家、地理学家和艺术家，创建了一个社区土壤研究工具包，指导公民科学家从与他们生活相关的多个角度研究土壤污染。除了通过创建和实施该工具包所产生的环境知识外，该项目还提供了一个独特的案例研究，以合作公民科学来解决复杂的社会环境问题。因此，这项研究有助于回答科学技术研究（STS）中的一个核心问题：什么样的实践能够有效地将对社会和文化的关注引入科学工作？这项研究包括三个相互关联的任务。第一个任务是对土壤测试领域进行社会学分析，包括对大约20名从事社区土壤研究的人进行深入访谈，并对相关文件进行广泛分析，以了解广泛进行土壤测试的社会和物质障碍。这些访谈和文件为公民科学项目提供了必要的技术和社会背景，同时也阐明了技术、标准、政策、材料、文化观念、政治冲突、纪律压力和经济力量如何创造“未完成”土壤科学的条件。第二项任务是设计和推广社区土壤研究工具包，包括自己动手（DIY）砷和铅测试工具包。创建工具包包括实验室工作和参与式设计，不断记录和解决技术和社会问题之间出现的紧张关系，跨越不同的规模，并就不同受众的可信度而言。第三项任务是与社区合作者一起开展土壤污染的参与性研究，使用社区土壤研究工具包并在必要时对其进行修订。通过与公民科学参与者的深入访谈和详细的人种学现场笔记，对不同背景下的过程和结果进行了比较。公众参与该项目有助于宣传重金属的危害，支持当地提高对污染环境关注的努力，并将大学研究人员和公众聚集在一起，创造社会和科学知识。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Polluted soil threatens the environment and human health in communities worldwide, yet soil contamination has not been the focus of many public health interventions, and people who encounter heavy metals in soil are rarely aware of their presence or the harms they can cause. This project responds to this problem with a "citizen science" approach to studying soil, focusing on urban soil. Citizen science involves the public in scientific research; in this case, testing soil for heavy metal contaminants, exploring the sources of contamination, and envisioning strategies for protecting public health. A shortcoming of many citizen science projects is that they attempt to reproduce narrow disciplinary approaches to a research topic, rather than grappling with the multifaceted ways that people interact with their environments. In contrast, this project assembles a multidisciplinary team, including sociologists, a chemical engineer, an environmental scientist, a geographer, and an artist, to create a Community Soil Study Toolkit that guides citizen scientists to study soil contamination from multiple perspectives that are relevant to their lives. In addition to the environmental knowledge yielded by creating and implementing this Toolkit, this project provides a unique case study of collaborative citizen science to address complex socio-environmental problems. The research therefore helps to answer a central question in science and technology studies (STS): what kinds of practices are effective for bringing attention to society and culture into scientific work? The research includes three interrelated tasks. The first task is a sociological analysis of the soil testing field, including in-depth interviews with about 20 people engaged in community-based soil research and extensive analysis of relevant documents, to understand the social and material obstacles to widespread soil testing. These interviews and documents provide necessary technical and social context for the citizen science project, while also illuminating how technologies, standards, policies, materials, cultural perceptions, political conflicts, disciplinary pressures, and economic forces create conditions of "undone" soil science. The second task is the design and diffusion of a Community Soil Study Toolkit, including do-it-yourself (DIY) arsenic and lead test kits. Creating the Toolkit includes laboratory work and participatory design, continually documenting and addressing the tensions that arise between technical and social questions, across different scales, and in terms of credibility for different audiences. The third task is to carry out participatory studies of soil contamination with community-based collaborators, using the Community Soil Study Toolkit and revising it as necessary. The process and outcomes are compared across contexts using in-depth interviews with citizen science participants and detailed ethnographic field notes. The participation of the public in this project serves to communicate the hazards associated with heavy metals, support local efforts to raise concerns about contaminated environments, and bring university researchers and the public together to create social and scientific knowledge.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.