Marine Mammalogists: Who Are We?

Thanks for checking in here to take our survey. We are going to leave the survey open for the next month to see if we can't get more responses to really get an idea of our marine mammal community. Thank you, Cynde McInnis and Diane Alps

Please feel free to go to our google form and fill in your information about collaboration. (You are also prompted to do this at the end of the survey if you are interested.) At the first of the year, we will send out an email to everyone who responded and see if we can't help connect people!

Our abstract for our poster from the conference. The diversity of members of the marine mammal community is rich, and wide-ranging. The typical Biennial conference hosts an average of 1,700 attendees, with over half of them giving presentations on a broad-range of topics, from anatomy and taxonomy, to policy and education. What is the common thread amongst this diverse community? Is it just the subject matter? And as a community, who are we? Is the overarching interest of the community solely information gathering? Is there a fundamental concern for conservation and awareness? Looking at the interests and motivations of individual members of the community will help to identify the overall motivation and aspirations of the entire community. A survey of the marine mammal community investigates these questions to develop a baseline understanding of the community’s interests and strengths. Science, education and advocacy are all important components of marine mammal research and conservation. How do individual members identify within these three categories? How much overlap is there? Do you feel confident in all three areas, or would you prefer to partner with others that can help provide data for your advocacy campaigns, or educational curriculum? Collaborations can connect specialists with outcomes that can empower each other to improve methods, materials and impact.