How Learning a Project’s Language Helps Newcomers Stick Around in Online Science Communities
When people join online science projects like Gravity Spy to help researchers identify noise patterns in data from gravitational wave detectors, they’re not just doing science — they’re entering a new social world with its own language, terms, and ways of talking. If new volunteers don’t understand the group’s lingo, they may struggle to participate fully or stop coming back altogether.
This study looked at how newcomers to Gravity Spy “learn the language” of the community over time, and how closely aligning with that language affects whether they stay involved. It shows that language isn’t just about communication — it’s a sign of belonging.
Examining the Lingo in Gravity Spy
In the study, the researchers analyzed over 130,000 online comments made by volunteers in Gravity Spy, a citizen science project hosted on Zooniverse. Using a measure called cosine similarity, they tracked how users’ language became more similar to that of the larger community over time.
They measured how timing, participation frequency, and social behaviors (like asking questions, tagging, or linking to others) influenced how well newcomers adapted to the community’s language. They tested whether those who “spoke the language” of the community were likelier to stick around in the project.
What did their study uncover about language?
- Volunteers who used language similar to the community were significantly more likely to keep participating.
- People who contributed more often during their first week, linked to resources, and referenced other users were better at adopting the group’s language.
- As time passed, the language used in the project became more complex, making it harder for newcomers to catch up.
- Those who observed a while before posting (sometimes called “lurkers”) tended to assimilate better than those who jumped right in.
Beyond virtual citizen science
As citizen science communities grow, their language becomes richer — but also more exclusive. Without help, new users may feel lost. Platforms like Gravity Spy could benefit from interactive tutorials, AI-powered glossaries, or real-time language suggestions to help users understand evolving jargon.
Image credit: Flickr user uclengineering (source) / Licensed under CC BY 2.0. No changes were made to the original image.
These findings don’t just apply to science — any online collaboration (like open-source projects or advocacy groups) could benefit from tools that help users learn and adapt to the community’s way of talking.
To cite this summary
Jackson, C. B. (2025). How Learning a Project’s Language Helps Newcomers Stick Around in Online Science Communities. OASIS Summary of Jackson (2025), Forthcoming in Proceedings of ICWSM.
