Finding Nature

The adoption of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework at COP15 could be a first step towards fixing the broken relationship with (the rest of) nature. The framework is built around a theory of change and vision which recognises the underlying causes of biodiversity loss – the exploitation of nature fuelled by social values and behaviours. Fundamentally the framework speaks of relationships through recognising the need to live in harmony with nature.  The language is significant, it recognises that biodiversity is fundamental to human well-being, recreation and cultural inspiration, and that it supports all systems of life on earth. It refers to ‘Mother Earth‘ and recognises that nature is vital for a good quality of life. The text recognises our place in nature, the fundamental need for nature and a harmonious relationship with it.

Although the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework is a plan to address the decline in biodiversity, it is also a plan to transform our relationship with nature by 2030. The framework aims to ‘catalyse, enable and galvanize urgent and transformative action’ by Governments, local governments, and communities across society – a whole of Government and whole of society approach. To do this the framework outlines a vision with specific goals and 23 action-oriented global targets for urgent action by 2030, with the aim of achieving the outcome-oriented goals for 2050.

The first 8 targets aim to reduce threats to biodiversity – from a human-nature relationship perspective broadly reducing the use and control of nature. These include the headline making targets to protect 30% of the globe for nature. Five targets are related to meeting people’s needs through sustainable use of nature. This includes access to nature, but goes beyond that to ‘mainstreaming’ urban biodiversity and improving human connection to nature and wellbeing. The start of a much deeper relationship than that delivered by access alone. Together with the wider values and language of harmony, and the need to be informed by science, evidence and indigenous worldviews this is a significant moment for nature connectedness research and related work.

The final 10 targets focus on tools and solutions for implementation and mainstreaming. Targets such as full integration of biodiversity across sectors and reducing over consumption – a country-level factor we found was a key factor in individual connection to nature.

Overall, the framework recognises that the human-nature relationship is fundamental, a causal issue and readers of my blog with know that nature connectedness captures that relationship. So the framework sits well with the moderation of negative human-nature relationships and promotion of positive relationships that build connection with nature – the pathways approach laid out in our Ecosystems & People paper. The framework provides a great basis for scaling-up nature connection work already underway and moving from viewing nature as a resource to an essential part of who we are.

 

 

The biodiversity stripes have been so popular they now have their own home at biodiversitystripes.info which aims to raise awareness of the loss of wildlife. The new site also provides some new stripes based on UK data for priority species, moths and farmland birds. Measuring and indicating biodiversity is very complex, which can make telling a simple story about the loss of wildlife difficult, but there is an urgent need to make the problem visible. People need to be aware for change to happen.

In other recent news, the stripes have been adopted by the Nature Positive campaign led by Nature4Climate. A global effort to raise the profile of action to protect, manage and restore natural ecosystems for the benefit of the world’s peoples, the climate and biodiversity. They also appeared at the COP27 Nature Zone, part of the backdrop to many events. Alongside the climate warming stripes, the biodiversity stripes decorated a baton to be taken to COP15 to unite the climate and nature agenda.

Some might wonder why biodiversity matters and about the link to nature connectedness. Biodiversity is the variety of life on Earth. It supports life and is fundamental in providing the air we breathe and food we eat. Humans evolved within a vibrant, biodiverse, natural world. It is inherently good and vital for our wellbeing. Yet through a disconnected relationship dominated by use and control of nature we have done great damage to the natural world. A spiralling breakdown as when biodiversity decreases so does our relationship with nature. A failing relationship that the UN recognise as the root cause of the environmental crises. Which is why our wider research explores ways to fix the failing relationship with nature.

 

Please note, the biodiversity stripes have been updated and now have a dedicated site at https://biodiversitystripes.info/  

The biodiversity stripes I shared in the summer have been very popular. This follow-up post shares some more news on their use and a revised set of stripes – updated data in the latest Living Planet Report means two more grey stripes had to be added, as our green natural world turns increasingly grey.

First the updated stripes. The biodiversity stripes are based on the Living Planet Index which tells us that the population of mammals, birds, fish, amphibians and reptiles has now seen an average drop of 69% globally since 1970. George Simons has suppored the bio-stripes by creating hi-res versions of the global stgripes suitable for print – if you are interested get in touch).

Once again I’ve also simply overlaid a declining flock of birds onto the global bio stripes – please get in touch if you’d like to create some compelling overlays.

And now the news. Last week the stripes were used to open an official seminar by Scientist Philippe Grandcolas from the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) on climate change and biodiversity loss with French MPs in the French National Assembly.

This follows a makeover of my biodiversity stripes toucan, which is available on a variety of Greenpeace tops – an excellent and worthwhile Christmas gift i’m sure!

 

 

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George Simons recently founded Ruleo with the mission of using technology as a gateway to nature, to make it accessible, engaging and fun for all children to grow, play and learn with the natural environment. The desired outcomes are to improve children’s health, wellbeing and inspire environmentally friendly behaviours. Their current focus is developing an immersive app that connects children with nature through play and learning. They are collaborating with experts, organisations and charities that support learning in nature, outdoor play and nature connectedness for children and families, and are growing new relationships to establish content development partnerships. Ruleo’s priority is to unearth new investment opportunities to enable the next phase of app development. Please email George to find out more or discuss partnership opportunities – george@ruleo.uk

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LPI 2022. Living Planet Index http://stats.livingplanetindex.org/. Downloaded 8 August 2022

Use of the biodiversity or nature stripes work must include appropriate acknowledgement of Miles Richardson and, when based on their data, LPI (LPI’s preferred format: LPI 2022. Living Planet Index database. 2022 www.livingplanetindex.org). Note that products derived from LPI data for financial gain are prohibited without written permission of ZSL and WWF.

There is global recognition from organisations such as the UN of the need to restore our broken relationship with nature. The science of nature connectedness captures that relationship and allows research to identify ways to improve it. With clear links between an individual’s nature connectedness, their psychological wellbeing, and engagement in nature-friendly behaviours, improving nature connectedness can help unite human and planetary wellbeing. Our latest paper, published recently in Sustainability, brings together previous research in a meta-analytic review to explore the impact of experimental manipulations and field interventions to improve nature connectedness in adult populations.

This blog summarises the full paper with sections on:

• A Summary of the Types of Study
• Results
• Recommendations for practice
• Recommendations for research
• Conclusions

A Summary of the Types of Study

The process of gathering all these studies showed a variety of approaches have been trialled. So, the analysis examined the relative effects of type of contact with nature (direct or indirect), quality of engagement (active or passive) and the timing of the engagement (single session, repeated practice or residential). Here’s a description and details of those four approaches:

• Type of Contact – 27 studies with 3242 people involved direct contact with nature. 9 studies with 707 people tested indirect contact with nature. Indirect contact was facilitated through videos (n=3), images (n=2), audio (n=1), or guided nature focussed imagery/meditation practices (n=3). Six of the studies involving direct contact were residential camps or experiences where people took part in a range of outdoor activities in a variety of settings. Ten involved walking in natural places such as forests, nature reserves, gardens, or urban nature. Two others involved running in a university sports field or visiting an animal park. Five studies invited people to carry out nature-based activities in their own time, with four studies asking people to engage with nature in particular ways (i.e., appreciating and noticing it) during their daily routine without asking them to spend more time outside.
• Active or passive – There was a roughly even split between studies prompting active engagement (53%) (e.g. 30 Days Wild or our own 3 Good Things in Nature) or passive (47%) exposure to nature – although residential studies did not detail the type of engagement. Most indirect contact studies involved passive engagement, such as looking at photos or where nature featured as backgrounds to meditation or mindfulness training.
• Repetition & time – Around a half of the studies used brief one-off periods of contact or engagement with nature, often twenty minutes or less. Others ranged from two to several hours. Short one-off activities included all indirect nature contact studies except for one. Six residential experiences lasted from 2 days to 1 month and involved a diverse range of nature engagement activities, including education, walking and meditation and mindfulness. Fourteen studies involved repeated (e.g. daily or weekly) nature contact or engagement, over periods ranging from 5 days to two months.
• Sustained effects – Only fourteen of the 36 studies included follow-up measures which are essential to ascertain if interventions have a lasting, and therefore meaningful impact.

A note on environmental education: A recent meta-analysis found no significant effect of environmental education on nature connectedness.

Results

Importantly, the 12 studies with follow-up measures and involving 1259 participants showed a significant positive effect – showing sustained improvements in nature connectedness are possible. The human-nature relationship can be improved.

Lasting increases in nature connection were observed after regular nature activities and nature-noticing practices, as well as regular mindfulness and meditation practices carried out in real or simulated nature contexts. No differences were observed between different types of contact, quality of engagement. So, the results suggest a variety of forms of contact and engagement work.

Recommendations for practice

1 – Engage people with nature

The research shows that asking people to engage with nature increases feelings of nature connectedness. While further research to support development of interventions for lasting nature connection is needed, the evidence is already in place for real-world application.

2 – Encourage repeated nature engagement activities

There is little to no evidence to suggest that brief one-off activities have any impact on nature connection. Sustained increases in nature connectedness were observed when people were invited to engage with nature on a daily or more regular basis. While more research is needed to develop and test interventions for sustained nature connectedness, there is already sufficient evidence to support ongoing development of programmes and practices of regular nature engagement

3 – Create conditions for nature connection – scale-up!

The work shows that repeated engagement with nature brings sustained increases in nature connectedness, so use the pathways to nature connectedness to help design activities, programmes, places, spaces and systems to facilitate this. On a national and local scale this can be achieved through approaches to education, health, urban planning, transport and housing that recognise the value of accessible nature engagement to fix the broken relationship with nature.

Recommendations for research

1. Examine the impacts of a wider range of nature engagement activities

While there is variety, such as walking in nature, meditation and mindfulness in natural settings, looking at nature images, appreciating nature, and sensory exploration of nature – additional research is needed to explore the impact of a wider range of activities designed to activate pathways to nature connectedness. For example, while many studies involve nature walks, there has been little exploration of the impact of sitting with nature or experimental studies of arts-based engagement with nature. Another area with surprisingly little research is the impact of taking part in citizen science activities.

2. Identify factors that result in biggest and most sustained increases in nature connection

We made a distinction between passive and active engagement with nature to categorise the studies. There is a need for further research to examine this distinction more closely, and to develop understanding of the different types of active engagement with nature. Carefully designed studies that aim to identify, isolate and test ways of engaging with nature are vital for understanding the most effective pathways to nature connectedness, and the design of interventions. There are also many open questions as to the impact of other factors on nature connectedness, for instance, what is the effect of being with other people while undertaking nature connection activities? Does social engagement enhance or decrease the impact of nature contact? What is the relative impact of the quality of a space compared to people’s psychological engagement with nature in that space?

3. Design and test practices for growing sustained nature connection

There is a lot of scope for development of additional activities that aim to activate pathways to lasting nature connectedness, and research exploring the feasibility and efficacy of these. Of key importance, however, is identification of factors that make an intervention appealing to people to try in the first place, and to maintain regular practice.

Conclusions

Targeting sustained improvements in nature connectedness can help address the global calls for a new relationship with nature required for a sustainable future. The analysis confirms that carefully designed interventions can deliver sustained increases in nature connectedness. Those sustained benefits can involve a variety of forms of engagement, but typically involve being prompted to engage with nature regularly. Although simple, this finding is important. We know many people do not ‘notice nature’ regularly and urban residents often spend only a few minutes in green spaces each day – even when they have good access. With global calls to fix the broken relationship with nature, simple and repeated engagement with nature can range from programmes focussed on individuals to creating the conditions for nature connectedness through considering the delivery of everything from education to health and macro factors such as the design of urban areas and land use.

 

 

Sheffield, D., C. W. Butler, and M. Richardson. 2022. “Improving Nature Connectedness in Adults: A Meta-Analysis, Review and Agenda” Sustainability 14, no. 19: 12494. https://doi.org/10.3390/su141912494

The biodiversity stripes I shared recently have been very popular. This follow-up post shares another set of stripes that help show why the human-nature relationship has failed and biodiversity is falling.

First, a reminder that the biodiversity stripes were based on the the Living Planet Index which tells us that the population of mammals, birds, fish, amphibians and reptiles has seen an average drop of 68% globally since 1970. The global stripes start green in 1970 and turn grey as we enter the 2000s.

Global Bio Stripes – Data: Living Planet Index http://stats.livingplanetindex.org/

We know that at the personal level a close relationship with nature is built on five types of engagement with nature. From simply engaging with nature through noticing it, to a deep, emotional and meaningful relationship, where we celebrate and share how nature brings meaning to our lives. Here nature appears in what we write. So it follows that as nature, represented by biodiversity, declines, opportunities to engage with nature also decline and nature has less meaning in our lives. A situation shown by the frequency of nature words appearing in English. Shown below by stripes showing how the frequency of the word ‘nature’ in English has fallen since 1800.

In a deeper analysis of works of popular culture throughout the twentieth-century, Kesebir and Kesebir (2017) identified a cultural shift away from nature with a sharp decline in references to nature from the 1950s through to 2000. Noticeable dips in nature references occurred alongside the dawns of new technology (television in the 1950s and video games in the 1980s). The widespread use of smartphones may be another new dawn of further disconnection, potentially accelerated by uses such as ‘selfie-taking’ and social media which reflect and ultimately shape culture itself. Similarly, as references to nature have declined, individualistic words have increased in popular culture. So, while use of the word ‘nature’ has flatlined over the past century, use of the the word ‘me’ has quadrupled since 1990.

Other researchers have noted how modern life is creating an epidemic of narcissism. People are becoming more self-centred and ‘collective narcissism’ forms too. As you might expect, narcissism is negatively related to a close relationship with nature and is seen as a major barrier to solving environmental problems. A powerful sense of self creates a world where the rest of life is peripheral. The fall in the rest of life (biodiversity) and rise in self-focus (use of me) over the last 50 years can be seen clearly below.

This informal blog is reflected in our recent wider research. We’ve found that a closer relationship with nature, where the rest of life isn’t so peripheral, is related to opportunities to engage with nature – from biodiversity itself, to urbanisation and land use. And to consumption and technology –  income and smartphone ownership.

As biodiversity falls and becomes more distant, nature matters less. We celebrate and write about it less in a spiral of decline. Instead, it would seem we celebrate and write about ourselves. People need to feel part of something and worthwhile, but a close relationship with nature provides that too – explaining the feeling that one’s life is worthwhile four times more than socio-economic status. Nature’s recovery and biodiversity matters.