You are so right about societal factors. Add in time or the lack of time as another factor. Somebody who is working full-time, has small children, a partner, pets, and a home to maintain, and lives an hour away from “interesting” natural areas simply won’t have the time to make as many observations as do. I’m retired, live by myself, and spend as little time as possible on housework and home maintenance. Plus, I own a car and have the money to drive an hour if I want to, not to mention the money to take longer trips a couple times a year. Most people are nowhere near as privileged as I am. and that will show up as “bias” in their observations.
ETA: And let us not forget (as I just did!) there are many people who have disabilities that make it difficult or exhausting or plain impossible to get out and see much of the natural world.
Same here. Especially if I’ve made several observations of a common species in an area within a short time period (a month or so) I tend to skip it for a while. And most common grasses and the like are just left undocumented. They just look practically identical to me and I have no clue as to how they could be classified to any meaningfully specific level that would help further ID.
And I also remember this one German biologist who specialized in aphids. She said you can be happy if you can even guess a genus level ID as there’s a good number you can effectively only ID with a gene sequencer, and you should also always mention the plant they munch on and she doesn’t sometimes know why she decided to specialize in aphids of all possibilities and…
I do NOT live by myself. I’m in a relationship. My duties include housework and home maintenance. But like you, I spend as little time as possible on it. Not good!
@catchwords “Seems like there must be a massive bias towards creatures active during daylight.”
The opposite is true for some groups, such as some diurnal lizards. I identify lizards in the Amazon quite a bit, and many observations there come from tourists (another bias in some way) out on trail at night. Those same lizards aren’t observed during the day as much, not because they are inactive, but because they are well camouflaged with the leaf litter. Instead, at night observations catch them sleeping. There are some species of diurnal lizards, not just in the Amazon, but in the desert SW of the US as well, that I’ve never seen in the daytime, but can find easy enough at night.
I’m the one who has full-time job and little kids so overwhelming majority of my observations are on the way between home and work. It’s actually impressive to me how many different species I can observe just taking different routes there.
If you are focused on birds, you’re likely to miss the reptiles on the ground. And vice versa. Same if you’re focused on insects on bushes; the bigger vertebrate species might get missed.
The best way to get around your own biases is to go on a nature hike with someone with different interests and different search images in their head. My wife, for example, picks up on things in the field that I miss.
I stick to hiking trails and my (bicycle) commute route. This means I miss everything that’s off trail. To do more unbiased observation, I would need to observe in some kind of grid pattern. However, my preferred trails have rattle snakes (like this one) so stepping off-trail increases the odds of stepping on them and getting bit. I also stick to plants and slow-moving animals since I low-effort observe with a smartphone and it’s much harder to get good photos with motion or at a distance, for example this small bird or this raptor.
And let’s not forget a huge “bias” – that most people don’t have direct access to the forest canopy or treetops. If you try hiking a trail in a rainforest, and then going on a canopy walk in the same rainforest, you will see completely different species. The same applies to some degree in every woodland regardless of climate or biome.
For example, in North Carolina, we have a bignonia called Cross Vine. More often than not, fallen flowers on the ground clue me into the presence of a vine flowering so high in the canopy that I would not have noticed it without that cue.
The Wind River Canopy Crane in the Pacific Northwest revealed the incredible diversity of the canopy in even that relatively cold climate. Worldwide, canopy research is still a wide-open frontier. Whereas iNaturalist observations in woodlands are heavily biased toward organisms visible from ground level.
Between my job and the summer sun, it’s easier for me to observe nocturnal things on week days. A quick check shows 2/3 of my 2024 observations in my home county are at night! I’m sure the number is much lower for the average user.
As a specialist identifier, I’m definitely also biased toward observing the taxa I specialize in, which in turn leads to me observing organisms associated with similar habitats and such. For example, I might go to a pond to look for bivalves, and end up photographing the water striders, fish, freshwater snails, geese, aquatic beetle larvae, etc. I also tend to observe geese and killdeer near the water.
I do know of many ‘specialist observers’ which only observe a specific taxon they’re interested in. But, oftentimes, this data is more useful and sort of balances out the lack of data for such taxa
I have no idea about my subconscious biases!
I have a jillion conscious biases according to the day, subject to change momentarily, as a senior that disabled out of work at 50… there’s good days and bad days and winter. How I feel and weather, season, whether I’m going for exercise (ha!) or just to wander and think. Whatever moves is a fun way to choose. A lot of stuff I just “see”… why did I stop here? Oh! Look! That’s my usual mode. I’ve been wandering and photographing the outdoors about 4 decades.
I should add @eyekosaeder that my reply was meant to be a general addition to the thread, not a direct response to your specific post. I’m pretty new to forums and ‘social media’ in general, so I’m honestly not even aware if this is a minor gaff on my part or a huge one.
Thanks for the discussion. Always good to get a new perspective.
HUMOUR AHEAD 
