Avoid errors in the identification of individuals

Feature Requests
,
1

Hi,

First of all, a huge thank you to Anastasia for all her help !

Here’s a feature we would really need (please, feel free to say if there are points to clarify, English is not my mother tongue).

What Wildbook should this feature be in?
=> Whiskerbook

What would you like to see?
=>
We want to avoid any risk of error in the identification of individuals who could “spread” over time. Indeed, if a collaborator is mistaken and identifies the lynx named “CHAMAR” on a photo when it is actually the lynx named “CHACOR” (oops), his misidentified pictured will serve as one of the references for future matches and we will again identify “CHACOR” as “CHAMAR” the next time.

So we would need for example one of those two options:

  • be able to assign a role to users allowing them to record an encounter, to consult the encounters, to launch a match and to see the results but not to validate this match or to assign an individual to a photo.
    We would then let only selected and more experienced users perform this critical last assignment step.

  • Another option would be → the matches validated by the contributors are in an “unapproved” state by default and there is then a validation step when someone to whom we have assigned this role can edit it in an “approved” state. In this second case, it would also be necessary to have the possibility of launching matches by comparing only with the old “approved” matches and ignoring the “unapproved”.

(A last option would be a “peer review” => The “match” is validated only if X number of contributors confirms it.)

Do not hesitate to tell me if the need is not clear or if there is already a solution to meet this need to avoid the transmission of identification errors.

How would this functionality help you?
We need to ensure that there are no errors in the identifications, to avoid that the database drifts and that our monitoring and studies are then based on erroneous data.

The currently possible solution of letting contributors only add images without being able to see the proposed match result doesn’t really fit the need, because contributors like to quickly get a first idea of ​​the identity of the lynx, even if it’s still unapproved.

If you have a solution to meet this need, that would be really great.

THANKS :slight_smile:

2

Lucas

We at African Carnivore Wildbook would support getting this functionality as an option as we can see the need for it in certain areas and projects. Thank you for the suggestion. Regards

Paul
@ACWadmin1

1 Like
3

Thanks for your support, Paul :+1:

Little update : we worked collectively to identify what seemed most relevant to us and it was rather the second option presented :
→ matches validated by contributors are in an “unapproved” state by default and then there is a validation step when someone we’ve assigned this role to can change it to an ‘approved’ state.

During the matching process, all the pictures in the database are used, but the name of the individual identified in each picture is only given if the match has been validated beforehand (see example below). In other words, photos from encounters with a match proposed but not yet validated must not display the names of individuals (nor be included in the individual page), in order to avoid the propagation of identification errors.

For example, If one tries to match a photo “A” and the software detects a possible match with photo “B” (previously matched as the individual named “LYNX1” by a contributor and then validated by a data manager) and with photo “C” (previously matched by a contributor as the individual named “LYNX1” but not yet validated by a data manager) .
=> The software offers pairing with both the images B and C, but only indicates the name “LYNX1” for picture B, and “unidentified” for picture C.
If you open the “LYNX1” individual page, you can see image B (match has already been approved) but not photo C (match is still to be approved).

I made a specific post for the roles and permissions there.

Thanks again :blush: