People and Nature最新文献

{"title":"What informs human–nature connection? An exploration of factors in the context of urban park visitors and wildlife","authors":"Shery Hayes Hursh, Elizabeth Perry, David Drake","doi":"10.1002/pan3.10571","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/pan3.10571","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000\u0000\u0000Human–nature connection (HNC) is a concept derived from investigating the formulation and extent of an individual's identification with the natural world. This relationship is often characterized as an emotional bond to nature that develops from the contextualized, physical interactions of an individual, beginning in childhood. This outcome presents complexity in evaluating the development of HNC but suggests optimism in the pathways for enhancing lifelong HNC.\u0000\u0000As urban populations increase, there is a growing recognition worldwide of the potential for urban green space to cultivate HNC and thus shape the environmental identity of urban residents.\u0000\u0000The results of an online survey of 560 visitors to three community parks (managed primarily to provide a variety of physical, social and cultural opportunities) and three conservation parks (managed primarily to protect native plants and wildlife) in Madison, Wisconsin, USA, were used to investigate HNC.\u0000\u0000Linear mixed effects models evaluated visitors' HNC as a function of their (1) literacy and sentiment about wildlife species, (2) park experience, (3) number and frequency of nine childhood and adult recreation experiences, and (4) demographics.\u0000\u0000Across the park response groups, the number and frequency of childhood and adult recreation experiences was significantly associated with HNC, and this positive association persisted in multiple recreation activities. Furthermore, species literacy and sentiment, visiting a park for ‘Nature’, and frequent and extended visitation also was significantly associated with HNC by park type.\u0000\u0000Our research demonstrates the importance of lifelong recreation experiences in the development and enhancement of HNC and provides evidence for differences in the expression of HNC associated with particular attributes of urban park visitors and their views of wildlife.\u0000\u0000Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.","PeriodicalId":52850,"journal":{"name":"People and Nature","volume":"43 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.1,"publicationDate":"2024-01-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139444944","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Non‐material contributions of nature expressed by former tourists of Mount Kilimanjaro, Tanzania","authors":"Jasmine Pearson, Milena Gross, Johanna Hofmann","doi":"10.1002/pan3.10575","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/pan3.10575","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000\u0000\u0000Nature‐based tourism provides an outlet for people to experience non‐material nature's contributions to people (NCP) and can even promote care for nature. Yet, the literature on NCP is still dominated by studies on regulating and material NCP, with limited research on non‐material contributions.\u0000\u0000Semi‐structured interviews and photo‐elicitation methods were conducted online with 38 former tourists who have hiked Mount Kilimanjaro, Tanzania, to investigate NCP experiences during their hiking journey. Drawing on the guiding principles of the Intergovernmental Panel on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), an interwoven approach was used to link context‐specific NCP expressed by tourists to the generalizing perspective.\u0000\u0000Ten context‐specific non‐material NCP emerged including Aesthetic experiences; Learning and life‐changing perspectives; New and unique experiences; and Social cohesion and bonding. All context‐specific NCP were linked back to the generalizing perspective, with most NCP falling under the generalizing category of Physical and psychological experiences.\u0000\u0000This paper reveals the unique and diverse ways that nature contributes to people's lives, promoting the visibility of multiple perspectives and their incorporation into biodiversity conservation and sustainable management strategies. Through an interwoven approach, NCP can be compared on a universal scale while respecting the context‐specificity of human–nature interactions across different social‐ecological contexts.\u0000\u0000Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.","PeriodicalId":52850,"journal":{"name":"People and Nature","volume":"25 26","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.1,"publicationDate":"2024-01-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139389279","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Favourite places for outdoor recreation: Weak correlations between perceived qualities and structural landscape characteristics in Swedish PPGIS study","authors":"Jonathan Stoltz, Carl Lehto, M. Hedblom","doi":"10.1002/pan3.10574","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/pan3.10574","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000\u0000\u0000Connections between outdoor recreation and various health and well‐being benefits are well established. However, questions remain regarding which landscape characteristics that best predict places in the landscape that correspond to people's needs and preferences. The perceived sensory dimensions (PSDs) model proposes eight basic perceived qualities that people commonly seek in outdoor environments to support complementary needs: a Natural, a Cultural, a Cohesive, a Diverse, a Sheltered, an Open, a Serene and a Social quality respectively.\u0000\u0000These PSDs have increasingly been suggested as a tool for green space assessment and planning. How strongly they correlate with objective landscape characteristics is, however, still an open question. We surveyed recreationists in Sweden, tasking them with noting their favourite places on a map (n = 275), and to report the degree to which the PSDs were present. The qualities typically reported as most prominent at these places were Open, Serene and Sheltered, while the least prominent were Social and Cultural.\u0000\u0000A cluster analysis further revealed that favourite places could be classified into two main groups regarding perceived qualities. One associated with presumably more restorative qualities, emphasising Natural and Serene settings, the other instead suggesting a more outward‐directed experience, strong in the perceived Social and Cultural dimensions.\u0000\u0000Machine learning models, however, revealed weak links between objective landscape characteristics and perceived qualities, with stronger correlations found with attributes connected to personal characteristics, such as the degrees to which a person identifies as nature or urban oriented.\u0000\u0000Although largely confirming the basic relations between the PSDs suggested by earlier studies, our results cast some doubt on the way they often have been understood and used, as describing an ‘objective’ truth of places, rather than representing qualities that largely emanate from the individual experience. Our results instead confirm previous reports of weak general links between objective landscape measures and perceived qualities.\u0000\u0000Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.","PeriodicalId":52850,"journal":{"name":"People and Nature","volume":"58 7","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.1,"publicationDate":"2023-12-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138945799","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Where wilderness is found: Evidence from 70,000 trip reports","authors":"Monika M. Derrien, S. Winder, Spencer A. Wood, Lesley Miller, E. Lia, L. Cerveny, Sarah Lange, Sonja H. Kolstoe, Grace McGrady, Anna Roth","doi":"10.1002/pan3.10569","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/pan3.10569","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000\u0000\u0000Outdoor recreation is an essential way many people engage with nature. The provision of public spaces for recreation intersects with conservation practices motivated by intertwined social and ecological values, such as strict practices associated with the concept of ‘wilderness’. Debates persist about how such concepts and management practices influence people's recreation experiences.\u0000\u0000Many US public land management agencies facilitate opportunities for outdoor recreation, relying on management frameworks and tools intended to foster specific experiential qualities. But these frameworks and tools assume simplistic relationships between settings and people's experiences, and managers rarely assess these relationships.\u0000\u0000This study uses a data set of nearly 70,000 crowdsourced trip reports from a hiking website to understand the qualities of visitors' experiences on trails. We study the geographic distribution of experiential qualities commonly associated with US wilderness areas: aesthetics, awe, challenge, pristineness, quietness, solitude and timelessness. Using analytical methods that rely on machine learning and natural language processing, we identify these experiential qualities in trip reports from hundreds of routes, and use generalized linear models to analyse relationships between the frequency of each experiential quality and the route's administrative, built, biophysical, geographic and social settings.\u0000\u0000We find that four of the seven experiential qualities (aesthetics, awe, challenge and solitude) are commonly described in trip reports, each appearing in 15%–55% of manually coded reports. The extent to which setting characteristics explained variability in experiences differed, ranging from 34% of the variability in the proportion of trip reports describing aesthetics to 55% for awe. The setting characteristics associated with each experiential quality also differed, with characteristics such as trail mileage and summit destinations having stronger influences on experiential qualities than characteristics such as wilderness designation.\u0000\u0000Synthesis and applications. Our findings suggest the need to consider more diverse variables in experience–setting relationships, develop more robust models to characterize those relationships and create new data sources to represent understudied variables. These advances would help empirically inform and improve frameworks and tools used for recreation and wilderness planning and monitoring, and potentially promote more responsive management to evolving social–ecological values.\u0000\u0000Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.","PeriodicalId":52850,"journal":{"name":"People and Nature","volume":"32 2","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.1,"publicationDate":"2023-12-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138956435","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Inclusion of ecosystem services in the management of municipal natural open space systems","authors":"N. Wessels, N. Sitas, Patrick O'Farrell, K. Esler","doi":"10.1002/pan3.10572","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/pan3.10572","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000\u0000\u0000Unprecedented urbanisation in the Global South is transforming natural urban landscapes, impacting on the ability of nature to provide essential ecosystem services.\u0000\u0000Within the context of pressures facing many urban natural open spaces, particularly in Africa, we used a local municipality in South Africa as a case study to (i) identify local government priorities for a natural open space system; (ii) develop an understanding of whether, and how, ecosystem services are considered by local government, and the reasons thereof; and (iii) ascertain the extent of proactive planning regarding regulating and other ecosystem services, including the temporal and spatial scales, and implications. In‐depth qualitative interviews (n = 12) were undertaken with senior municipal officials representing departments whose work impacts the environment. Municipal decision‐support documents were also analysed for any direct and/or indirect references to ecosystem services.\u0000\u0000Planning for, and management of, ecosystem services provided by natural open spaces is influenced by interwoven infrastructure, municipal service delivery and equity challenges, complex institutional constraints and poverty, with little focus on the socio‐economic opportunities and other benefits of natural open space systems. Values, perceptions and knowledge also influence the management of ecosystem services.\u0000\u0000The study contributes to understanding the opportunities and challenges for the future governance of natural open space in the Global South, which require explicit consideration in municipal planning, management and budgeting processes.\u0000\u0000Policy and management implications identified include prioritisation of the regulating functions provided by natural open space systems, pivotal to the urban resilience agenda; building on the inherent appreciation of nature features as city assets, while achieving socio‐economic upliftment; improved (on‐site) collaborative management of natural open spaces; and involvement of local government officials in the preparation and updating of environmental policies and decision‐support documents, to ensure skills and knowledge transfer and interest are entrenched in local government departments.\u0000\u0000Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.","PeriodicalId":52850,"journal":{"name":"People and Nature","volume":" 8","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.1,"publicationDate":"2023-12-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138959907","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Multidimensional mental representations of natural environment among Chinese preadolescents via draw‐and‐write mapping","authors":"Z. Yue, Yichuan Meng, Jin Chen","doi":"10.1002/pan3.10577","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/pan3.10577","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000\u0000\u0000The mental associations that children have with the natural environment can be referred to as their natural representations. These representations encompass a blend of shared consensus and individual differences, playing a pivotal role in shaping human relationships with nature and influencing attitudes and behaviours. However, comprehending children's natural representations, particularly among preadolescents with limited verbal narrative abilities, remains a challenge.\u0000\u0000To address this challenge, we conducted a study employing a draw‐and‐write task and a questionnaire survey. Our investigation aimed to understand how the level of nature experiences and demographic variables affects the multidimensional representations of nature among preadolescents (aged 9–12) in China. Specifically, we examined the impacts of direct, indirect and vicarious nature experiences on their natural representations. These representations included dimensions such as the level of wildness, cognitive complexity, extent of elaboration, expression of emotion and representation style. These dimensions were based on literature review and supported by empirical data collected from children's drawings.\u0000\u0000Our findings showed that children's drawings of nature not only share similarities but also display significant variations. Most of their drawings include natural components, such as living and non‐living elements, while a notable proportion of drawings depicts human activities. Interestingly, we observed notable differences in the level of wildness, elaboration and representation style among preadolescents from different regions. Additionally, we found that vicarious nature experiences have a significant positive impact on the cognitive complexity, extent of elaboration and positive emotional expression in children's drawings, while direct nature experiences also have a weaker but still significant positive effect on the elaboration. Moreover, female students exhibit greater proficiency in these three aspects compared to their male counterparts.\u0000\u0000The study highlights the significance of the surrounding environment and nature experiences, especially vicarious nature experience, in shaping the natural representations of preadolescents. Using draw‐and‐write mapping is recommended as a valuable approach to understanding the children's mental representations of the natural environment.\u0000\u0000Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.","PeriodicalId":52850,"journal":{"name":"People and Nature","volume":"8 9","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.1,"publicationDate":"2023-12-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138959802","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Low knowledge of national biodiversity symbols among urban South Africans limits their potential value as conservation flagship species","authors":"Ondwela Tshikombeni, C. M. Shackleton, M. Ntshudu","doi":"10.1002/pan3.10563","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/pan3.10563","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000\u0000\u0000Most countries have declared one or more animal or plant species to be among their national symbols, termed here national biodiversity symbols. National biodiversity symbols are the species formally or informally recognised by societies and countries as having meaning to one or more of national identity, values and unity.\u0000\u0000It has been proposed previously that national biodiversity symbols can be used as flagship species to advance habitat conservation in their respective countries. However, this assumes that the symbols are well‐known and revered by the citizens of the country concerned. We examined this assumption via direct interviews with 382 urban residents in four towns in South Africa, which is a mega‐biodiversity country with five national biodiversity symbols (a national tree, flower, animal, bird and fish).\u0000\u0000We found that less than 3% of the urban respondents could name all five species, ranging from 6% for the national tree to 40% for both the national flower and national animal. Knowledge of other national symbols (flag and anthem) were equally low. The number of national biodiversity symbols known increased with income and education level of respondents. Despite limited knowledge of which species were the national biodiversity symbols, almost two‐thirds of respondents felt that having national biodiversity symbols was important for promoting national identity.\u0000\u0000These findings show that from a heritage perspective a great deal more awareness needs to be developed in South Africa around the national biodiversity symbols. From a conservation perspective, it indicates that the national biodiversity symbols are unlikely, at this stage at least, to be useful as flagship species for habitat conservation programmes.\u0000\u0000Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.","PeriodicalId":52850,"journal":{"name":"People and Nature","volume":"3 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.1,"publicationDate":"2023-12-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138996733","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Research on the benefits of nature to people: How much overlap is there in citations and terms for ‘nature’ across disciplines?","authors":"Kate Howlett, E. Turner","doi":"10.1002/pan3.10573","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/pan3.10573","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000\u0000\u0000Research on the diverse benefits of nature to people is characterised by a broad range of disciplines involved, encompassing a variety of approaches, methods and terminologies. While a diversity of approaches is valuable, it can lead to difficulties in integrating and sharing findings, and could form a barrier to effective knowledge exchange, hindering the development and applications of research outputs.\u0000\u0000As a starting point for this scoping review, we chose four broad research areas (medicine, psychology, education and environment), selected to represent disparate approaches to research on the benefits of nature to people, within and across which to explore overlap in citations and terms used to describe nature.\u0000\u0000We conducted expert consultation and a snowball‐based approach to source publications, resulting in a sample of 210 papers spanning multiple disciplines within each of our four research areas. For each paper, we recorded the discipline of the journal in which it was published (publishing discipline), the discipline of its first author (first‐author discipline), the number of times journals of each discipline were cited in their bibliographies (cited discipline) and the term(s) used in the paper's title or abstract to describe the aspect of nature being explored (nature term).\u0000\u0000The cited disciplines were significantly different between publishing and first‐author disciplines, with papers from psychology, education and public health citing distinct communities of papers. However, disciplines generally cite a wide range of other disciplines, with articles in medical journals being particularly broadly cited.\u0000\u0000Nature terms were significantly different between publishing and first‐author disciplines, with some degree of consistency within disciplines (e.g. education papers consistently used a narrow range of nature terms, such as ‘outdoor learning’). However, there was a notably high range of nature terms used within psychology and public health papers, indicating that research from these disciplines may be particularly prone to being overlooked by search strings.\u0000\u0000The wide range of disciplines cited is encouraging, since this indicates that diverse research areas are generally aware of each other's work. However, to avoid unnecessary expansion of nature terms and support searchability, we propose four key terms for nature: (‘outdoor learning’ OR ‘outdoor education’), (‘nature’ OR ‘natural’), (‘green space’ OR ‘greenspace’) and (‘biodiversity’ or ‘trees’), which could be used across disciplines. We particularly propose that at least one of these be included in every paper, and all four should be included in review search strings. This is likely to result in a better understanding of the valuable, disparate contributions made by different disciplines to this expanding and important topic.\u0000\u0000Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.","PeriodicalId":52850,"journal":{"name":"People and Nature","volume":"50 8","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.1,"publicationDate":"2023-12-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138999944","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The perceived ecological and human well‐being benefits of ecosystem restoration","authors":"Matthew Jurjonas, Christopher A. May, Bradley Cardinale, Stephanie Kyriakakis, D. Pearsall, Patrick J. Doran","doi":"10.1002/pan3.10558","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/pan3.10558","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000\u0000\u0000Traditionally, ecosystem restoration has focussed on standard ecological indicators like water or habitat quality, species population abundance or vegetation cover to determine success. However, there is growing interest in how restoration might impact people and communities. For example, researchers have documented positive socio‐ecological links between restoration and human well‐being indicators like property value, natural hazard mitigation, recreation opportunity and happiness. Furthermore, public health benefits from restoration have been linked to public support for programmes.\u0000\u0000Drawing from this research, the United Nations declared 2021–2030 the ‘Decade of Ecosystem Restoration’ and set a goal to promote more socio‐ecological goals in ecosystem restoration. Nonetheless, there is still a lack of information on the extent to which restoration practitioners consider well‐being because many granting programmes only require ecological goals and monitoring.\u0000\u0000To explore how restoration practitioners design, implement and measure the success of their projects, we used the federally funded Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (GLRI) as a case study. Since 2010, GLRI has awarded over $3.5 Billion to over 5300 projects across the midwestern United States, but it does not presently require human well‐being considerations. We performed an online survey targeting project managers with a sample of GLRI projects (N = 1574). We received 437 responses and found that almost half set a human well‐being goal, and more than 70% of those who did believe they reached it. In comparison, 90% of project managers believed they met their ecological goals.\u0000\u0000These documented perceptions of positive impacts for both people and nature suggest that restoration may already transcend traditional indicators and monitoring for socio‐ecological metrics could capture many ‘unseen’ benefits. Therefore, we recommend that ecosystem restoration programmes adopt a socio‐ecological lens to document the full extent of their restoration outcomes.\u0000\u0000Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.","PeriodicalId":52850,"journal":{"name":"People and Nature","volume":"19 2","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.1,"publicationDate":"2023-12-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139005747","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Giant anteaters as bad omens: Determinants and implications of wildlife superstitions","authors":"Mariana L. Catapani, Arnaud L. J. Desbiez, Carla Morsello","doi":"10.1002/pan3.10568","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/pan3.10568","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000\u0000\u0000Superstitious beliefs threaten wildlife species, yet they have received limited attention in the scientific literature.\u0000\u0000Through a mixed‐method approach, including 259 face‐to‐face interviews, we explored the factors influencing superstitions about giant anteaters in the Brazilian Pantanal and their implications for both people and the species.\u0000\u0000Our results indicated that bad omen superstitions about giant anteaters could be explained by the psychological discomfort felt from the species' peculiarities, social influence, misconceptions about their biology and behaviour, and the frequency of the species' sightings. Age, gender and schooling did not influence superstitious adherence.\u0000\u0000Interviewees holding superstitious beliefs of bad luck reported worry, distress and anxiety in trigger situations. Most engage in superstitious behaviours to ward off bad luck. While some acts were harmless, others threatened people and giant anteaters.\u0000\u0000By explaining misconceptions and demystifying unique species characteristics that evoke psychological discomfort, conservationists might foster better coexistence between people and species historically associated with misfortune.\u0000\u0000Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.","PeriodicalId":52850,"journal":{"name":"People and Nature","volume":"55 4","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.1,"publicationDate":"2023-12-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138982384","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}