Multimodal Learning Has an Impact on Conservation Knowledge, Attitudes, and Behavioral Intentions Towards Spider Monkeys in Mayan Children From Punta Laguna, Yucatán

Abstract

Conservation education activities employing multimodal knowledge transmission, including art-based workshops, are a multidisciplinary tool that can be used to raise awareness of the natural environment in which we live. In this study, we implemented a conservation education workshop that combined different forms of knowledge transmission, to promote pro-environmental knowledge, attitudes, and behavioral intentions towards spider monkeys and their ecosystem, among 5- to 16-year-old students in a rural school in a Mayan community in Mexico (N = 27). The aim of the study was to (i) develop and implement a workshop tailored to the cultural context of Maya children in México, incorporating artistic activities and multimodal learning approaches, and (ii) evaluate its effectiveness by monitoring changes in participants' knowledge, attitudes, and behavioral intentions towards spider monkeys and their ecosystem. Our findings indicate overall increases in conservation-oriented knowledge and behavioral intentions following the workshop, with more pronounced gains in knowledge among girls and in behavioral intentions among older children. Attitudes toward spider monkeys were already high before the intervention and showed a small but statistically significant increase afterward. Children's drawings reflected increased references to morphological and ecological traits, although aspects related to social behavior and human-monkey interactions were less represented. These outcomes suggest that short-term, culturally embedded and multimodal educational interventions may promote conservation learning in rural communities, though some effects may be constrained by ceiling effects and topic complexity. Future research should explore the durability of these changes over time, the specific drivers of pre-existing pro-environmental attitudes, and the impact of prior familiarity and cultural context on learning outcomes.