Journal article

Eliciting Expert Knowledge in Conservation Science

TG Martin, MA Burgman, F Fidler, PM Kuhnert, S Low-Choy, M Mcbride, K Mengersen

Conservation Biology | Published : 2012

Abstract

Expert knowledge is used widely in the science and practice of conservation because of the complexity of problems, relative lack of data, and the imminent nature of many conservation decisions. Expert knowledge is substantive information on a particular topic that is not widely known by others. An expert is someone who holds this knowledge and who is often deferred to in its interpretation. We refer to predictions by experts of what may happen in a particular context as expert judgments. In general, an expert-elicitation approach consists of five steps: deciding how information will be used, determining what to elicit, designing the elicitation process, performing the elicitation, and transl..

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University of Melbourne Researchers

Grants

Awarded by AC-ERA (Australian Centre of Excellence for Risk Analysis)


Awarded by National Science Foundation


Funding Acknowledgements

We are grateful to E. Fleishman for her encouragement to write this paper and for her and E. Main's insightful and skillful editing. We are also grateful to W. Aspinall, M. Runge, K. Hayes, C. Cook, and an anonymous reviewer for their thoughtful and thorough reviews. T. G. M. and P. M. K. acknowledge the support of a CSIRO (Common-wealth Scientific and Industry Research Organisation) Julius Career Award, and M. B. was supported by AC-ERA (Australian Centre of Excellence for Risk Analysis) Project 0611 and a National Science Foundation Award (SES 0725025). T. G. M. and M. A. B. acknowledge the support of the National Environmental Research Program, Research Hub for Environmental Decisions. S. L. C. and K. M. gratefully acknowledge Commonwealth of Australia funding for the CRC (Cooperative Research Centre) program.