A new study finds that when people engage in participatory science activities that involve awe-inspiring natural phenomena, such as an eclipse, they more closely identify with science and feel a greater sense of belonging. Participatory science, also called citizen science, refers to projects in which members of the public contribute to the scientific process.
"Participatory sciences have led to many discoveries that scientists couldn't have made on their own," says Caren Cooper, co-author of a paper on the work and a professor of forestry and environmental resources at North Carolina State University. "Another great thing is that, by making observations, participants not only change what's known, they change in personal ways too."
"Although research has shown that engaging in participatory science increases the way people relate to science, there has been very little work on why," says Kelly Lynn Mulvey, corresponding author of the paper and a professor of psychology at NC State.
"We wanted to explore that area and also evaluate whether awe is a mechanism that changes the way people involved in participatory science projects think of themselves with regard to science."
The researchers focused on two concepts that are considered important for understanding how we can broaden science participation: science identity and science belonging. Science identity is the extent to which people see science as being part of who they are. Science belonging is the extent to which people feel like they fit in when engaged in science-related activities.
For this study, the researchers developed a participatory science project and worked with 528 people, ages 8 to 80, who volunteered to record the behavior of animals during the day of the total solar eclipse that traversed North America in 2024. Participants also completed a detailed survey designed to capture their sense of awe during the eclipse, their feelings of science belonging, and how their sense of science identity changed after making animal behavior observations.
"First of all, we saw increases in science identity and belonging for study participants who took part in this project," Mulvey says. "We also found that awe played a powerful role."
The researchers measured the role of awe and examined if participants felt more or less awe depending on whether they saw a partial eclipse or the totality – in which the sun was completely eclipsed.
"Participants who witnessed the totality reported significantly greater awe," Mulvey says. "And the greater the sense of awe that people reported, the greater the reported increase in science identity and belonging."
Another interesting aspect of the findings involved animal behavior. Study participants were given online training to identify animal behaviors, but were not experts in animal behavior. Thus, participants recorded behaviors before, during and after the eclipse, and the research team deduced whether and to what extent the behaviors changed.
"Once the observed activities were analyzed, we found that the sense of awe was greater for those study participants who also recorded unusual behavior by animals – even if the study participants didn't realize they were recording unusual behavior," says Mulvey.
"One exciting take-away here is that even a single experience can lead to meaningful changes in how you identify with science and whether you feel like you belong when engaging with science," says Mulvey. "These changes in science identity and belonging didn't require formal training or participation in a long-term study.
"It was also remarkable that everyone from small children to older adults felt a sense of awe and had an increased sense of science identity and belonging," says Mulvey.
"The big takeaway here is that doing science during an awesome experience made people feel more connected to science," says Adam Hartstone-Rose, co-author of the paper and a professor of biological sciences at NC State. "We think it's important to get people engaged with STEM fields, and anything we can do to increase feelings of identity and belonging with regard to science is valuable."
"It's also worth noting that you don't need a solar eclipse to feel awe," Mulvey says. "Small moments of awe can occur in your own neighborhood. And there are a wide variety of participatory science projects that people can connect with. For example, our project was hosted on SciStarter – and you can find thousands of other participatory science opportunities there."
The paper, "Awe in Nature Fosters Science Identity and Belonging in Participatory Scientists During an Eclipse," will be published May 27 in the journal People and Nature. The paper was co-authored by former NC State undergraduates Rhianna Absher, Nhaturie Atkinson and Brandon Wilson; NC State graduate students Martha Batul and Lara Martens; Ashley Deutsch of the New York Institute of Technology; and Jacqueline Cerda-Smith of Illinois State University.
