human connection to nature essay

Essay on Relationship Between Human And Nature

Students are often asked to write an essay on Relationship Between Human And Nature in their schools and colleges. And if you’re also looking for the same, we have created 100-word, 250-word, and 500-word essays on the topic.

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100 Words Essay on Relationship Between Human And Nature

The bond with nature.

People and nature are interconnected. We rely on the environment for survival, using its resources for food, shelter, and air. Nature, in return, benefits from our care and protection.

Respecting Nature

Respecting nature is essential. By protecting the environment, we ensure our own survival. We must recycle, reduce waste, and conserve energy to maintain this balance.

The Consequences of Neglect

Ignoring nature’s needs leads to problems like climate change and species extinction. These issues affect us directly, threatening our health and lifestyle.

Our relationship with nature is a delicate balance. By respecting and caring for the environment, we ensure a healthier, brighter future for all.

250 Words Essay on Relationship Between Human And Nature

The intrinsic connection, dependence and impact.

Nature provides essential resources such as air, water, food, and raw materials. These resources are not only crucial for our survival, but they also form the basis of our economic systems. However, our reliance on nature has led to significant environmental impacts. Deforestation, pollution, and climate change are direct consequences of human activities, threatening biodiversity and the stability of ecosystems.

The Reciprocal Relationship

The human-nature relationship is reciprocal. While we shape nature through our actions, nature, in turn, influences human behavior, culture, and mental health. Exposure to natural environments has been linked to reduced stress levels, improved mood, and enhanced cognitive function.

A Need for Rebalance

The current environmental crisis calls for a rebalance in the human-nature relationship. It necessitates a shift from exploitation to sustainable coexistence, where we respect and preserve nature’s intrinsic value. This shift requires a deeper understanding of our interconnectedness with nature and a collective effort to reduce our environmental impact.

In conclusion, the human-nature relationship is a complex and dynamic interaction that has significant implications for both parties. As we move forward, it is essential to foster a relationship of mutual respect and sustainability with nature to ensure the survival and wellbeing of all life on Earth.

500 Words Essay on Relationship Between Human And Nature

The intricate dance: human and nature.

The relationship between humans and nature is a complex interplay of dependence, respect, exploitation, and evolution. This relationship is not just crucial for our survival, but it also shapes our culture, beliefs, and our very identity.

Dependence: The Lifeline

Respect: the forgotten virtue.

Historically, humans have revered nature. Many ancient cultures worshipped nature deities and respected the land, the sea, and the sky. This respect was born out of an understanding of our dependence on nature, and the need to maintain a harmonious relationship with it. However, with the advent of industrialization and modernization, this respect has often been forgotten. We have begun to see nature as a resource to be exploited, rather than a partner to be respected.

Exploitation: The Double-Edged Sword

Our exploitation of nature has led to unprecedented advancements in technology, medicine, and living standards. However, it has also led to environmental degradation, loss of biodiversity, climate change, and a host of other problems. Our exploitation of nature has become a double-edged sword, providing us with short-term gains but threatening our long-term survival.

Evolution: The Path Forward

Conclusion: redefining the relationship.

The relationship between humans and nature is at a crossroads. We can continue down the path of exploitation and face the consequences, or we can choose a new path of respect, sustainability, and coexistence. The choice is ours to make. As we stand at this juncture, let us remember that our relationship with nature is not just about survival, but also about who we are as a species. It is about our values, our beliefs, and our legacy. It is about our future.

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Greater Good Science Center • Magazine • In Action • In Education

What Happens When We Reconnect With Nature

Humans have long intuited that being in nature is good for the mind and body. From indigenous adolescents completing rites of passage in the wild, to modern East Asian cultures taking “forest baths,” many have looked to nature as a place for healing and personal growth.

Why nature? No one knows for sure; but one hypothesis derived from evolutionary biologist E. O. Wilson’s “ biophilia ” theory suggests that there are evolutionary reasons people seek out nature experiences. We may have preferences to be in beautiful, natural spaces because they are resource-rich environments—ones that provide optimal food, shelter, and comfort. These evolutionary needs may explain why children are drawn to natural environments and why we prefer nature to be part of our architecture.

Now, a large body of research is documenting the positive impacts of nature on human flourishing—our social, psychological, and emotional life. Over 100 studies have shown that being in nature, living near nature, or even viewing nature in paintings and videos can have positive impacts on our brains, bodies, feelings, thought processes, and social interactions. In particular, viewing nature seems to be inherently rewarding, producing a cascade of position emotions and calming our nervous systems. These in turn help us to cultivate greater openness, creativity, connection, generosity, and resilience.

In other words, science suggests we may seek out nature not only for our physical survival, but because it’s good for our social and personal well-being.

How nature helps us feel good and do good

The naturalist John Muir once wrote about the Sierra Nevada Mountains of California: “We are now in the mountains and they are in us, kindling enthusiasm, making every nerve quiver, filling every pore and cell of us.” Clearly, he found nature’s awe-inspiring imagery a positive, emotive experience.

But what does the science say? Several studies have looked at how viewing awe-inspiring nature imagery in photos and videos impacts emotions and behavior. For example, in one study participants either viewed a few minutes of the inspiring documentary Planet Earth , a neutral video from a news program, or funny footage from Walk on the Wild Side . Watching a few minutes of Planet Earth led people to feel 46 percent more awe and 31 percent more gratitude than those in the other groups. This study and others like it tell us that even brief nature videos are a powerful way to feel awe , wonder, gratitude , and reverence—all positive emotions known to lead to increased well-being and physical health.

Positive emotions have beneficial effects upon social processes, too—like increasing trust, cooperation, and closeness with others. Since viewing nature appears to trigger positive emotions, it follows that nature likely has favorable effects on our social well-being.

This has been robustly confirmed in research on the benefits of living near green spaces. Most notably, the work of Frances Kuo and her colleagues finds that in poorer neighborhoods of Chicago people who live near green spaces—lawns, parks, trees—show reductions in ADHD symptoms and greater calm, as well as a stronger sense of connection to neighbors, more civility, and less violence in their neighborhoods. A later analysis confirmed that green spaces tend to have less crime.

Viewing nature in images and videos seems to shift our sense of self, diminishing the boundaries between self and others, which has implications for social interactions. In one study , participants who spent a minute looking up into a beautiful stand of eucalyptus trees reported feeling less entitled and self-important. Even simply viewing Planet Earth for five minutes led participants to report a greater sense that their concerns were insignificant and that they themselves were part of something larger compared with groups who had watched neutral or funny clips.

Need a dose of nature?

A version of this essay was produced in conjunction with the BBC's newly released Planet Earth II : an awe-inspiring tour of the world from the viewpoint of animals.

Several studies have also found that viewing nature in images or videos leads to greater “prosocial” tendencies—generosity, cooperation, and kindness. One illustrative study found that people who simply viewed 10 slides of really beautiful nature (as opposed to less beautiful nature) gave more money to a stranger in an economic game widely used to measure trust.

All of these findings raise the intriguing possibility that, by increasing positive emotions, experiencing nature even in brief doses leads to more kind and altruistic behavior.

How nature helps our health

Besides boosting happiness, positive emotion, and kindness, exposure to nature may also have physical and mental health benefits.

The benefits of nature on health and well-being have been well-documented in different European and Asian cultures. While Kuo’s evidence suggests a particular benefit for those from nature-deprived communities in the United States, the health and wellness benefits of immersion in nature seem to generalize across all different class and ethnic backgrounds.

Why is nature so healing? One possibility is that having access to nature—either by living near it or viewing it—reduces stress. In a study by Catharine Ward Thompson and her colleagues, the people who lived near larger areas of green space reported less stress and showed greater declines in cortisol levels over the course of the day.

In another study , participants who viewed a one-minute video of awesome nature rather than a video that made them feel happy reported feeling as though they had enough time “to get things done” and did not feel that “their lives were slipping away.” And studies have found that people who report feeling a good deal of awe and wonder and an awareness of the natural beauty around them actually show lower levels of a biomarker (IL-6) that could lead to a decreased likelihood of cardiovascular disease, depression, and autoimmune disease. 

Though the research is less well-documented in this area than in some others, the results to date are promising. One early study by Roger Ulrich found that patients recovered faster from cardiovascular surgery when they had a view of nature out of a window, for example.

A more recent review of studies looking at different kinds of nature immersion—natural landscapes during a walk, views from a window, pictures and videos, and flora and fauna around residential or work environments—showed that nature experiences led to reduced stress, easier recovery from illness, better physical well-being in elderly people, and behavioral changes that improve mood and general well-being.

Why we need nature

All of these findings converge on one conclusion: Being close to nature or viewing nature improves our well-being. The question still remains…how?

There is no question that being in nature—or even viewing nature pictures—reduces the physiological symptoms of stress in our bodies. What this means is that we are less likely to be anxious and fearful in nature, and thereby we can be more open to other people and to creative patterns of thought.

Also, nature often induces awe, wonder, and reverence, all emotions known to have a variety of benefits, promoting everything from well-being and altruism to humility to health.

There is also some evidence that exposure to nature impacts the brain. Viewing natural beauty (in the form of landscape paintings and video, at least) activates specific reward circuits in the brain associated with dopamine release that give us a sense of purpose, joy, and energy to pursue our goals.

But, regrettably, people seem to be spending less time outdoors and less time immersed in nature than before. It is also clear that, in the past 30 years, people’s levels of stress and sense of “busyness” have risen dramatically. These converging forces have led environmental writer Richard Louv to coin the term “ nature deficit disorder ”—a form of suffering that comes from a sense of disconnection from nature and its powers.

Perhaps we should take note and try a course corrective. The 19th century philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson once wrote about nature, “There I feel that nothing can befall me in life—no disgrace, no calamity (leaving me my eyes), which nature cannot repair.” The science speaks to Emerson’s intuition. It’s time to realize nature is more than just a material resource. It’s also a pathway to human health and happiness.

About the Authors

Kristophe Green

Uc berkeley.

Kristophe Green is a senior Psychology major at UC Berkeley. He is fascinated with the study of positive emotions and how they inform pro-social behavior such as empathy, altruism and compassion.

Dacher Keltner

Dacher Keltner, Ph.D. , is the founding director of the Greater Good Science Center and a professor of psychology at the University of California, Berkeley. He is the author of The Power Paradox: How We Gain and Lose Influence and Born to Be Good , and a co-editor of The Compassionate Instinct .

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Nature Essay for Students and Children

500+ words nature essay.

Nature is an important and integral part of mankind. It is one of the greatest blessings for human life; however, nowadays humans fail to recognize it as one. Nature has been an inspiration for numerous poets, writers, artists and more of yesteryears. This remarkable creation inspired them to write poems and stories in the glory of it. They truly valued nature which reflects in their works even today. Essentially, nature is everything we are surrounded by like the water we drink, the air we breathe, the sun we soak in, the birds we hear chirping, the moon we gaze at and more. Above all, it is rich and vibrant and consists of both living and non-living things. Therefore, people of the modern age should also learn something from people of yesteryear and start valuing nature before it gets too late.

Significance of Nature

Nature has been in existence long before humans and ever since it has taken care of mankind and nourished it forever. In other words, it offers us a protective layer which guards us against all kinds of damages and harms. Survival of mankind without nature is impossible and humans need to understand that.

If nature has the ability to protect us, it is also powerful enough to destroy the entire mankind. Every form of nature, for instance, the plants , animals , rivers, mountains, moon, and more holds equal significance for us. Absence of one element is enough to cause a catastrophe in the functioning of human life.

We fulfill our healthy lifestyle by eating and drinking healthy, which nature gives us. Similarly, it provides us with water and food that enables us to do so. Rainfall and sunshine, the two most important elements to survive are derived from nature itself.

Further, the air we breathe and the wood we use for various purposes are a gift of nature only. But, with technological advancements, people are not paying attention to nature. The need to conserve and balance the natural assets is rising day by day which requires immediate attention.

Get the huge list of more than 500 Essay Topics and Ideas

Conservation of Nature

In order to conserve nature, we must take drastic steps right away to prevent any further damage. The most important step is to prevent deforestation at all levels. Cutting down of trees has serious consequences in different spheres. It can cause soil erosion easily and also bring a decline in rainfall on a major level.

Polluting ocean water must be strictly prohibited by all industries straightaway as it causes a lot of water shortage. The excessive use of automobiles, AC’s and ovens emit a lot of Chlorofluorocarbons’ which depletes the ozone layer. This, in turn, causes global warming which causes thermal expansion and melting of glaciers.

Therefore, we should avoid personal use of the vehicle when we can, switch to public transport and carpooling. We must invest in solar energy giving a chance for the natural resources to replenish.

In conclusion, nature has a powerful transformative power which is responsible for the functioning of life on earth. It is essential for mankind to flourish so it is our duty to conserve it for our future generations. We must stop the selfish activities and try our best to preserve the natural resources so life can forever be nourished on earth.

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The Human–Nature Relationship and Its Impact on Health: A Critical Review

Valentine seymour.

1 Department of Civil, Environmental and Geomatic Engineering, University College London, London, UK

Within the past four decades, research has been increasingly drawn toward understanding whether there is a link between the changing human–nature relationship and its impact on people’s health. However, to examine whether there is a link requires research of its breadth and underlying mechanisms from an interdisciplinary approach. This article begins by reviewing the debates concerning the human–nature relationship, which are then critiqued and redefined from an interdisciplinary perspective. The concept and chronological history of “health” is then explored, based on the World Health Organization’s definition. Combining these concepts, the human–nature relationship and its impact on human’s health are then explored through a developing conceptual model. It is argued that using an interdisciplinary perspective can facilitate a deeper understanding of the complexities involved for attaining optimal health at the human–environmental interface.

Introduction

During the last century, research has been increasingly drawn toward understanding the human–nature relationship ( 1 , 2 ) and has revealed the many ways humans are linked with the natural environment ( 3 ). Some examples of these include humans’ preference for scenes dominated by natural elements ( 4 ), the sustainability of natural resources ( 5 , 6 ), and the health benefits associated with engaging with nature ( 7 – 9 ).

Of these examples, the impacts of the human–nature relationship on people’s health have grown with interest as evidence for a connection accumulates in research literature ( 10 ). Such connection has underpinned a host of theoretical and empirical research in fields, which until now have largely remained as separate entities.

Since the late nineteenth century a number of descriptive models have attempted to encapsulate the dimensions of human and ecosystem health as well as their interrelationships. These include the Environment of Health ( 11 ), the Mandala of Health ( 12 ), the Wheel of Fundamental Human Needs ( 13 ), the Healthy Communities ( 14 ), the One Health ( 15 ), and the bioecological systems theory ( 16 ). Each, however, have not fully incorporated all relevant dimensions, balancing between the biological, social, and spatial perspectives ( 17 , 18 ). In part this is due to the challenges of the already complex research base in relation to its concept, evidence base, measurement, and strategic framework. Further attention to the complexities of these aspects, interlinkages, processes, and relations is required for a deeper sense of understanding and causal directions to be identified ( 19 ).

This article reviews the interconnectivities between the human–nature relationship and human health. It begins by reviewing the each of their concepts and methodological approaches. These concepts will be converged to identify areas of overlap as well as existing research on the potential health impacts in relation to humanity’s degree of relationship to nature and lifestyle choices. From this, a developing conceptual model is proposed, to be inclusive of the human-centered perspective of health, viewing animals and the wider environment within the context of their relationship to humans. The model combines theoretical concepts and methodological approaches from those research fields examined in this review, to facilitate a deeper understanding of the intricacies involved for improving human health.

Defining the Human–Nature Relationship

It is beyond the scope of this paper to review the various connections at the intersect of humanity and the natural environment. Instead, I summarize key concepts and approaches from those four research fields ( Evolutionary Biology , Social Economics , Evolutionary Psychology , and Environmentalism ) outlined below, which have paid most attention to studying this research area. I then summarize areas of convergence between these connections in an attempt to describe the human–nature relationship, which will serve as background to this review.

It is anticipated that through drawing on these different fields of knowledge, a deeper level of understanding can be brought to the growing issue of humanity’s relationship with nature and its impact on health. This is because examining the human–nature relationship from a single disciplinary perspective could lead to partial findings that neglect other important sources as well as the complexities that exist between interlinkages, causal directions, processes, and relations.

Evolutionary Biology

Evolutionary biology is a branch of research that shortly followed Darwin’s ( 20 ) Theory of Evolution. It concerns the adaptive nature of variation in all animal and plant life, shaped by genetic architecture and developmental processes over time and space ( 21 ). Since its emergence over a century ago, the field has made some significant advances in scientific knowledge, but with intense debate still remaining among its central questions, including the rate of evolutionary change, the nature of its transitional processes (e.g., natural selection) ( 22 ). This in part owes to the research field’s interdisciplinary structure, formulated on the foundations of genetics, molecular biology, phylogeny, systematics, physiology, ecology, and population dynamics, integrating a diverging range of disciplines thus producing a host of challenging endeavors ( 23 , 24 ). Spanning each of these, human evolution centers on humanity’s life history since the lineage split from our ancestral primates and our adaptive synergy with nature.

In the last four decades, evolutionary biology has focused much attention on the cultural–genetic interaction and how these two inherent systems interrelate in relation to lifestyle and dietary choices [ Culturgen Evolution ( 25 ); Semi-Independent ( 26 ); Dual-Inheritance model ( 27 )]. Some of the well-known examples include humans’ physiological adaptation to agricultural sustenance ( 28 ), the gradual increase in lactose tolerance ( 29 ) as well as the susceptibility of allergic diseases (e.g., asthma and hay fever) in relation to decreasing microbial exposure ( 30 ).

This coevolutionary perspective between human adaptation and nature has been further conceptualized by Gual and Norgaard ( 31 ) as embedding three integrated systems (biophysical, biotic, and cultural). In this, culture is both constrained and promoted by the human genetics via a dynamic two-way interaction. However, bridging the gap between these research fields continues to generate much controversy, particularly as the nature of these evolutionary development processes differs widely (e.g., internal and external factors). This ongoing discussion is fueled by various scholars from multiple disciplines. Some have argued that one cannot assume all evolutionary mechanisms can be carried over into other areas ( 32 , 33 ), where genomes cannot evolve as quickly to meet modern lifestyle and dietary requirements ( 34 ). Conversely, others believe that humans have not entirely escaped the mechanisms of biological evolution in response to our cultural and technological progressions ( 35 ).

Evolutionary Psychology

Evolutionary psychology is a recently developed field of study, which has grown exponentially with interest since the 1980s. It centers on the adaptation of psychological characteristics said to have evolved over time in response to social and ecological circumstances within humanity’s ancestral environments ( 36 – 38 ). This reverse engineering approach to understanding the design of the human mind was first kindled by evolutionary theorist Charles Darwin ( 20 ) in the last few pages of Origin of Species ;

In the distant future … Psychology will be based on a new foundation, that of the necessary acquirement of each mental power and capacity by gradation [p. 447].

As such, evolutionary psychology is viewed by some to offer a metatheory that dissolves the traditional boundaries held in psychology (e.g., cognitive, social, personality, and development). Within this metatheory, all psychological theories implicitly believed by some to unify under this umbrella ( 37 ). However, the application of evolution to the study of psychology has not been without controversial debate in areas relating to cognitive adaptation, testability of hypotheses, and the uniformity of human nature ( 39 ).

During the past few decades, the field has presented numerous concepts and measures to describe human connectedness to nature. These include Deep Ecology ( 40 ), Extinction of Experience ( 41 ), Inclusion of Nature in Self ( 42 ), and Connectedness to Nature ( 43 ). However, the Biophilia hypothesis ( 44 ) remains the most substantially contributed to theory and argues for the instinctive esthetic preference for natural environments and subconscious affiliation for other living organisms. Supportive findings include humans’ preference for scenes dominated by natural elements ( 4 ), improved cognitive functioning through connectivity with nature ( 45 ) as well as instinctive responses to specific natural stimuli or cues (e.g., a common phobia of snakes) ( 46 ). More recently, evidence is emerging to suggest that connectivity to nature can generate positive impacts on one’s health, increasing with intensity and duration ( 47 ).

The underpinning of the Biophilia hypothesis centers on humanity’s source of attachment to nature beyond those on the surface particulars. Instead, it reflects thousands of years of evolutionary experience closely bonding with other living organisms ( 44 ). Such process is mediated by the rules of prepared and counter-prepared learning that shape our cognitive and emotional apparatus; evolving by natural selection via a cultural context ( 48 ). This innate value for nature is suggested to be reflected in the choices we make, experiences expressed as well as our longstanding actions to maintain our connection to nature ( 49 ). Nevertheless, many have gone on to recognize the research field’s need for revision and further evidentiary support through empirical analysis ( 50 ). Similarly, as other researchers have argued, these innate values should be viewed in complementary to other drivers and affinities from different sources that can also be acquired (e.g., technology and urban landscapes). This is because at the commonest level, as Orr ( 51 ) explains, humanity can learn to love what becomes familiar, a notion also reflected in the Topophilia (“love of place”) hypothesis ( 52 ).

Social Economics

Social economics is a metadiscipline in which economics is embedded in social, political, and cultural behaviors. It examines institutions, choice behavior, rationality as well as values in relation to markets ( 53 ). Owing to its diverse structure, the human–nature relationship has been explored in various contexts. These include the reflections of society’s values and identities in natural landscapes ( 54 ), condition of placelessness ( 55 ), and humanity’s growing ecosynchronous tendencies ( 56 ) as well as how the relationship has evolved with historical context ( 57 – 59 ). While the dynamics of human and nature coupled systems has become a growing interdisciplinary field of research, past work within social economics has remained more theoretical than empirically based ( 59 ).

The connection between the start of industrialized societies and the dynamically evolving human–nature relationship has been discussed by many ( 60 ), revealing a host of economic–nature conflicts. One example includes those metaphorically outlined in the frequently cited article “ The Tragedy of the Commons .” In this, it argues that the four laws of ecology are counter intuitive with the four laws of capitalism ( 5 , 6 ). Based on this perspective, the human–nature relationship is simplified to one of exchange value, where adverse costs to the environment are rarely factored into the equation ( 6 ). However, this is not to say that humanity’s increasing specialization and complexity in most contemporary societies are distinct from nature but still depend on nature to exert ( 61 ).

Central to the tenets outlined in Tragedy of the Commons is the idea of “gradually diminishing freedom” where a population can increasingly exceed the limits of its resources if avoidance measures are not implemented (e.g., privatization or publicly owned property with rights of entry) ( 5 , 62 ). Yet, such avoidance measures can be seen to reflect emerging arguments in the field of environmental justice, which researches the inequalities at the intersection between environmental quality, accessibility, and social hierarchies ( 63 ). These arguments derive from the growing evidence that suggests the human–nature relationship is seemingly disproportionate to those vulnerable groups in society (e.g., lack of green spaces and poor air quality), something public health researchers believe to be a contributing factor to health inequities ( 64 ). As such, conflicts between both private and collective interests remain a challenge for future social economic development ( 65 ). This was explored more fully in Ostrom’s ( 66 ) research on managing a common pool of resources.

Environmentalism

Environmentalism can be broadly defined as an ideology or social movement. It focuses on fundamental environmental concerns as well as associated underlying social, political, and economic issues stemming from humanity’s interactions affecting the natural environment ( 67 , 68 ). In this context, the human–nature relationship has been explored through various human-related activities, from natural resource extraction and environmental hazards to habitat management and restoration. Within each of these reflects a common aspect of “power” visible in much of the literature that centers on environmental history ( 69 ). Some examples included agricultural engineering ( 70 ), the extinction of animals through over hunting ( 71 ) as well as the ecological collapse on Easter Island from human overexploitation of natural resources, since disproven ( 72 – 74 ). Yet, in the last decade, the field’s presupposed dichotomy between humans and nature in relation to power has been critically challenged by Radkau ( 75 ) who regards this perspective as misleading without careful examination. Instead, they propose the relationship to be more closely in synchrony.

Power can be characterized as “ A person, institution, physical event or idea … because it has an impact on society: It affects what people do, think and how they live ” ( 76 ). Though frequently debated in other disciplines, in the context of the human–nature relationship, the concept of “power” can be exerted by both nature and humanity. In regards to nature’s power against humanity, it has the ability to sustain society as well as emphasize its conditional awareness, environmental constraints, and fragilities ( 77 ). In contrast, humanity’s power against nature can take the form of institutions, artifacts, practices, procedures, and techniques ( 70 ). In the context of this review, it focuses on nature’s powers against humanity.

It has been argued that human power over nature has altered and weakened in dominance ( 75 ) since the emergence of Rachel Carson’s book Silent Spring in 1962, and later concepts of Gaia ( 78 ), Deep Ecology ( 40 ), and Sustainable Development ( 79 ). Instead, humanity’s power toward nature has become one of a moral sense of protectionism or the safeguarding of the environment ( 80 ). This conservative behavior (e.g., natural defenses, habitat management, and ecological restoration) can be termed “Urgent Biophilia” ( 81 ) and is the conscious urge to express affinity for nature pending an environmental disaster. As Radkau ( 69 ) suggests, with warnings of climatic change, biodiversity loss, and depletions in natural resources, this poses a threat to humanity. As such, this will eventually generate a turning point where human power is overwhelmed by the power of nature, bringing nature and power into a sustainable balance. Nonetheless, as many also highlight, humanity’s responses to environmental disasters can directly impinge on an array of multi-causalities of intervening variables (e.g., resource depletion and social economics) and the complexity of outcomes ( 82 ).

An Interdisciplinary Perspective of the Human–Nature Relationship

Through exploring the key concepts found in evolutionary biology, social economics, evolutionary psychology, and environmentalism, this has enabled a broader understanding of the various ways humans are connected to the natural environment. Each should not be viewed as separate entities, but rather that they share commonalities in terms of mutual or conjoint information and active research areas where similarities can occur (see Table ​ Table1 1 below). For example, there is a clear connection between social economics, evolutionary psychology, and biology in areas of health, lifestyle, and biophilic nature ( 40 , 53 , 81 ) as well as between social economics and the environment in regards to balancing relationships of power ( 5 , 75 ). Similarly, economic–nature conflicts can occur between disciplines evolutionary psychology and social economics in relation to people’s affiliation for nature and industrial growth.

A summarized overview of human–nature relationship connections between those research fields explored .

Our understanding of the human–nature relationship and its underlying mechanisms could be further understood from an interdisciplinary perspective. In essence, the human–nature relationship can be understood through the Biophilia concept of humanity’s affiliation with nature as well as related concepts and measures to describe human connectedness to nature ( 49 – 53 ). Equally, Orr’s ( 51 ) perspective that at the commonest level humans can acquire other affinities to or learn to love different elements than those of the natural world (e.g., technology and urban environments) adds to this understanding. Further, while humanity, and indeed nature also, has not entirely escaped change, it cannot be assumed that all have been shaped by evolutionary mechanisms ( 42 , 44 ). Some have been shaped by what Radkau ( 75 ) terms as the power shift between humans and nature, which is evolving, as it has and will keep on doing. As such, the human–nature relationship goes beyond the extent to which an individual believes or feels they are part of nature. It can also be understood as, and inclusive of, our adaptive synergy with nature as well as our longstanding actions and experiences that connect us to nature. Over time, as research and scientific knowledge progresses, it is anticipated that this definition of the human–nature relationship will adapt, featuring the addition of other emerging research fields and avenues.

Defining Health

Conceptualizing “health” has often generated complex debates across different disciplines owing to its multidimensional and dynamic nature ( 83 ). It is, however, beyond the scope of this paper to review the many ways these concepts have been previously explored ( 84 – 86 ). Instead, “health” is reviewed and viewed more generally through the lens of the World Health Organization 1948 definition.

The World Health Organization defined “health” simply as the physical, social, and mental well-being of humanity, in which “health” was widened beyond those biomedical aspects (e.g., disease and illness) to encompass the socioeconomic and psychological domains ( 85 ). This classical definition advocated health’s shift toward a holistic perspective, with emphasis on more positive attributes ( 84 , 87 ) and was not simply “ the mere absence of disease and infirmity ” [( 83 ), p. 1]. It also reflected people’s ambitious outlook after the Second World War, when health and peace were seen as inseparable ( 83 , 84 ). Since then, this shift has seen a major growth in the last 30 years, primarily in areas of positive health and psychology ( 88 – 92 ).

Despite its broad perspective of human health, the definition has also encountered criticism in relation to its description and its overall reflectance of modern society. For instance, the use of the term “completeness” when describing optimal health has been regarded by many as impractical. Instead, Huber et al ( 83 ) propose health to be the “ability to adapt and to self-manage” and invite the continuation of further discussions and proposals of this definition to be characterized as well as measured through its three interrelated dimensions; physical, mental, and social health. Similarly, others have highlighted the need to distinguish health from happiness ( 84 ) or its inability to fully reflect modern transformations in knowledge and development (e.g., technology, medicine, genomics as well as physical and social environments) ( 86 ). As such, there have been calls to reconceptualize this definition, to ensure further clarity and relevance for our adaptive societies ( 83 ).

Broadly, health has been measured through two theoretical approaches; subjective and objective ( 85 ). The subjective approach is based on individual’s perceived physical, emotional, and cognitive experiences or functioning. By contrast, the objective approach measures those variables, which are existing and measurable external to an individual’s internal experience such as living conditions or human needs that enable people to lead a good life (e.g., health markers, education, environment, occupational attainment, and civic involvement) ( 85 ). Together, these approaches provide a more comprehensive picture of a person’s health status, which are applicable across its three health components (physical, mental, and social), as described below.

First, physical health is defined as a healthy organism capable of maintaining physiological fitness through protective or adaptive responses during changing circumstances ( 83 ). While it centers on health-related behaviors and fitness (including lifestyle and dietary choices), physiological fitness is considered one of the most important health markers thought to be an integral measure of most bodily functions involved in the performance of daily physical exercise ( 93 ). These can be measured through various means, with examples including questionnaires, behavioral observations, motion sensors, and physiological markers (e.g., heart rate) ( 94 ).

Second, mental health is often regarded as a broad concept to define, encapsulating both mental illness and well-being. It can be characterized as the positive state of well-being and the capacity of a person to cope with life stresses as well as contribute to community engagement activities ( 83 , 95 ). It has the ability to both determine as well as be determined by a host of multifaceted health and social factors being inextricably linked to overall health, inclusive of diet, exercise, and environmental conditions. As a result, there are no single definitive indicators used to capture its overall measurement. This owes in part to the breadth of methods and tends to represent hedonic (e.g., life satisfaction and happiness) and eudaimonic (e.g., virtuous activity) aspects of well-being, each known to be useful predictors of physical health components ( 96 ).

Third, social health can be generalized as the ability to lead life with some degree of independence and participate in social activities ( 83 ). Indicators of the concept revolve around social relationships, social cohesion, and participation in community activities. Further, such mechanisms are closely linked to improving physical and mental well-being as well as forming constructs, which underline social capital. Owing to its complexity, its measurement focuses on strengths of primary networks or relationships (e.g., family, friends, neighborliness, and volunteering in the community) at local, neighborhood, and national levels ( 97 ).

Current Knowledge on the Human–Nature Relationship and Health

This section summarizes existing theoretical and literature research at the intersection of the human–nature relationship and health, as defined in this review. This has been explored through three Subsections “ Physical Health ,” “ Mental Health ,” and “ Social Health .” It aims to identify areas of convergence as well as gaps and limitations.

Physical Health

Though it is widely established that healthy eating and regular exercise have major impacts on physical health ( 98 ), within the past 30 years research has also identified that exposure to nature (e.g., visual, multisensory, or by active engagement) is equally effective for regulating our diurnal body rhythms to ensure physical vitality ( 99 ). Such notion stems from Wilson’s ( 44 ) proposed “Three Pillars of Biophilia” experience categories (Nature of Space, Natural Analogs, and Nature in Space), which relate to natural materials and patterns experienced in nature, inducing a positive impact on health ( 9 ). Empirical research in this domain was first carried out by Ulrich ( 46 ) who found that those hospital patients exposed to natural scenery from a window view experienced decreased levels of pain and shorter recovery time after surgery. Following this, research in this academic field has grown exponentially and encompasses a large literature base on nature’s health benefits. These include improvements in neurological and circadian rhythms relating to exposures to natural sunlight ( 100 , 101 ), undergoing “Earthing” or physical contact with the Earth’s surface regulates diurnal body rhythms ( 102 ) as well as walking activities in forest environments reducing blood pressure levels ( 8 ).

In spite of its increasing findings, some have suggested the need for further objective research at the intersect of nature-based parameters and human health ( 9 ). One reason for this is that most studies have yet to be scrutinized to empirical scientific analysis ( 55 , 103 ) owing to the research area’s reliance on self-reported measures with the need for inclusion of more quantitative forms of data (e.g., physiological and biochemical indicators). This presents inherent difficulty in comparing assessment measures or different data types relative to the size and scale of the variables being evaluated ( 9 ). Further, there still remain evidence gaps in data on what activities might increase levels of physical health as well as limited amount of longitudinal datasets from which the frequency, duration, and causal directions could be inferred ( 104 ).

Mental Health

Mental health studies in the context of connecting with nature have also generated a growing research base since the emergence of the Biophilia concept in the mid-1980s ( 45 ). Much of its research within the Evolutionary Psychology discipline examines the recuperative effects of nature on well-being and its beneficial properties following researcher’s arguments of humanity’s affiliation for nature ( 105 ). Supporting research has been well documented in literature during the last few decades. These include “Heraclitean motion” or natural movement ( 14 ), natural sounds ( 106 ), children’s engagement activities within green settings ( 7 , 107 ) as well as esthetic preferences for nature and natural forms ( 4 , 49 ).

Criticisms of this research area center on the inability to decipher causal effects and direction of such benefits and in part relates to its predominant focus on “recuperative measure” than that of detecting its “source” ( 105 ). In light of this, reviewers repeatedly remark on researchers’ tendencies to focus on outcomes of well-being, neglecting the intervening mechanisms that sustain or inhibit well-being ( 108 ). Similarly, further mixed-method approaches and larger sample sizes are needed in this research field. This would enhance existing evidence gaps to enhance existing knowledge of variable interlinkages with other important sources (e.g., physical and social health aspects) as well as the diversity that exists between individuals ( 104 ).

Social Health

In the last two decades, the relationship between people and place in the context of green spaces has received much attention in academic literature in regards to its importance for the vitality of communities and their surrounding environments ( 109 ). As studies have shown, the presence of green space can promote social cohesion and group-based activities, aspects that are crucial for maintaining social ties, developing communities, and increasing individual’s well-being (e.g., horticulture and ecological restoration) ( 110 ). Examples of findings include usage of outdoor space exponentially increases with number and locality of trees ( 111 ), children’s activities in green spaces improves social development ( 7 ) as well as accessibility to green spaces enhances social bonds in communities ( 112 ).

One of the main limitations within this field relates to the generally perceived idea that public green spaces are freely open to everyone in all capacities ( 113 ). This limitation has been, as already, highlighted from the emerging arguments in the field of environmental justice and economic–nature conflicts ( 63 ). As such, many researchers highlight the need to maintain awareness of other barriers that might hinder cohesion and community participation (e.g., semi-public space and social exclusion). Further, there still remains a gap between academic research and local knowledge, which would otherwise lead to more effective interventions. However, without implementing participatory engagement, many studies risk misrepresenting the true social, economic, and political diversity that would increase both our understanding of “real life” problems of concern as well as bringing depth to data collected ( 114 ). Nonetheless, for such approach to be implemented requires sufficient time, cost, and an adequate scale of resources to ensure for aspects of coordination, communication, and data validation ( 115 ).

Impacts of the Human–Nature Relationship on Health

During the past four decades, researchers, health practitioners, and environmentalists alike have begun to explore the potential link between the human–nature relationship and its impact people’s health ( 10 ). This in part owes to the increasing evidence accumulating in research literature centering on the relationships between the following areas: chronic diseases and urbanization, nature connectedness and happiness, health implications of contemporary society’s lifestyle choices as well as the adverse impacts of environmental quality on the health of humans and non-humans alike ( 116 , 117 ).

Such health-related effects that have been alluded to include chronic diseases, social isolation, emotional well-being as well as other psychiatric disorders (e.g., attention deficit disorders and anxiety) and associated physical symptoms ( 7 , 118 ). Reasons for these proposed links have been suggested to stem from various behavioral patterns (e.g., unhealthy diets and indoor lifestyles) associated with consumerism, urbanization, and anthropogenic polluting activities ( 117 , 119 ). Further, these suggested links have been inferred, by some, to be visible in other species (e.g., insects, mice, and amphibians) as a consequence to living in unnatural habitats or enclosures ( 120 – 122 ). Nonetheless, research within this field remains speculative with few counter examples (e.g., some species of wildlife adapting to urban environments), requiring further empirical analysis ( 108 ).

With a growing trend in the number of chronic diseases and psychiatric disorders, costs to the U. K.’s National Health Service (NHS) could rise as the use of prescriptive drugs and medical interventions increases ( 123 ). However, this anticipated trend is considered to be both undesirable and expensive to the already overwhelmed health-care system ( 124 ). In concurrence are the associated impacts on health equity ( 125 , 126 ), equating to further productivity and tax losses every year in addition to a growing gap in health inequalities ( 127 ).

Furthermore, population growth in urbanized areas is expected to impact future accessibility to and overall loss of natural spaces. Not only would this have a direct detrimental effect on the health of both humans and non-humans but equally the functioning and integrity of ecosystem services that sustain our economic productivity ( 128 ). Thereby, costs of sustaining our human-engineered components of social–ecological systems could rise, having an indirect impact on our economic growth and associated pathways connecting to health ( 129 , 130 ). As such, researchers have highlighted the importance of implementing all characteristics when accounting ecosystem services, particularly the inclusion of natural and health-related capital, as well as their intervening mechanisms. This is an area, which at present remains difficult to synthesize owing to fragmented studies from a host of disciplines that are more conceptually rather than empirically based ( 131 ).

Toward an Interdisciplinary Perspective of Human and Ecosystem Health

Since the late nineteenth century, a number of descriptive models have been developed to encapsulate the dimensions of human health and the natural environment as well as their interrelationships ( 17 ). These include the Environment of Health ( 11 ), the Mandala of Health ( 12 ), the Wheel of Fundamental Human Needs ( 13 ), and the Healthy Communities ( 14 ). As VanLeeuwen et al ( 17 ) highlight in their review, each have not fully incorporated all relevant characteristics of ecosystems (e.g., multiple species, trade-offs, and feedback loops, as well as the complex interrelationships between socioeconomic and biophysical environments). Further, the Bioecological systems theory model encapsulates the biopsychological characteristics of an evolving theoretical system for scientific study of human development over time ( 16 , 132 ). However, the model has been suggested by some ( 133 , 134 ) to be static and compartmentalized in nature, emphasizing instead the importance of evolving synergies between biology, culture, and technology.

More recently, the concept “One Health” has gradually evolved and increased with momentum across various disciplines ( 15 ). It is broadly defined as the attainment of optimal health across the human–animal–environmental interfaces at local, national, and global levels. It calls for a holistic and universal approach to researching health, an ideology said to be traceable to pathologist Rudolf Virchow in 1858 ( 18 ). Yet, the concept has received criticisms regarding its prominence toward the more biological phenomena (e.g., infectious diseases) than those of a social science and spatial perspective ( 18 , 135 ). Some have therefore suggested its need to adopt an interdisciplinary approach to facilitate a deeper understanding of the complexities involved ( 13 ).

To address these limitations identified in the above models, a suggested conceptual model has been outlined below (Figure ​ (Figure1). 1 ). It is both inclusive of all relevant characteristics of ecosystems, their continuously evolving synergies with human health as well as a balance between the biological, social, and spatial perspectives. This is achieved through combining the perspective of the human–nature relationship, as summarized in Section “ Defining the Human–Nature Relationship ” of this review, with those human-centered components of health (physical, mental, and social), as defined by the World Health Organization in 1948 in Section “ Defining Health .” It aims to facilitate a deeper understanding of the complexities involved for attaining optimal human health ( 19 ). I will now describe the conceptual model.

Interdisciplinary perspective of human and ecosystem health [image on the inside circle is by Baird ( 136 ) with the background image, added text, and embedded illustrations being the author’s own work] .

First, the outer circle is representative of “nature” that both encompasses and interconnects with the three human-centered components of health (physical, mental, and social). Through this it emphasizes humanity’s interrelationship with the environment. As identified in Section “ Defining the Human–Nature Relationship ” of this review, the human–nature relationship can be experienced through various biological, ecological, and behavioral connections. For instance, social, political, and economic issues stemming from humanity’s interactions affecting the natural environment (e.g., natural resources, environmental hazards, habitat management, and restoration), as explored in Subsections “ Social Economics ” and “ Environmentalism .”

Second, in the inner circle, the three components of human health (physical, mental, and social) are interconnected through a cohesive triangle to reflect their interdisciplinary and dynamic natures, as outlined in Section “ Defining Health .” Further, this cohesive triangle acts on two levels. First, as a single construct of health based on these components combined. Second, the underlying intervening mechanisms that sustain or inhibit health, which can derive from each of these separately ( 105 ). Thereby, it not only focuses on the outcomes or “recuperative measure” of health but also the source of such outcomes and their directions, as highlighted in Section “ Mental Health ” ( 104 ).

The middle circle represents the interconnected relationship between humanity and the natural environment with relevance to human health (see Current Knowledge on the Human–Nature Relationship and Health ). This has been indicated by the two-way arrows and incorporates Gual and Norgaard’s ( 31 ) coevolutionary perspective between human adaptation and the natural environment. In this way, the relationship is continually interconnected via two-way physical and perceptual interactions. These are embedded within three integrated systems (biophysical, biotic, and cultural), with all humanity knows of the world comes through such mediums ( 31 ). As such, the human–nature relationship goes beyond the extent to which an individual believes or feels they are affiliated with nature (e.g., Biophilia concept). It can also be understood as, and inclusive of, our adaptive synergy with nature as well as our longstanding actions and experiences that connect us to nature.

Utilizing this developing conceptual model, methodological approaches can be employed from those research fields explored in this review, enabling a more interdisciplinary framework. The characteristics, descriptions, implications, and practicalities of this are detailed in Table ​ Table2 2 below. The advantage of this is that a multitude of knowledge from both rigorous scientific analysis as well as collaborative participatory research can be combined bringing a greater depth to data collected ( 114 ). This could be achieved through using more mixed-method approaches and adopting a pragmatic outlook in research. In this way, the true social, economic, and political diversity of “real life” as well as the optimal human health at the human–environmental interface can be identified. As such, a more multidimensional perspective of human health would be gained, knowledge that could be implemented to address those issues identified in Section “ Impacts of the Human–Nature Relationship on Health ” (e.g., improving nature and health ecosystem service accounting). Nonetheless, adopting a pragmatic outlook brings its own challenges, as explored by Onwuegbuzie and Leech ( 137 ), with several researchers proposing frameworks that could be implemented to address these concerns ( 138 , 139 ).

A summarized overview of human and ecosystem health from an interdisciplinary perspective .

Summary and Conclusion

One of the imperatives for this article is to review existing theoretical and research literature on the many ways that humans are linked with the natural environment within various disciplines. Although widely discussed across the main four research fields – evolutionary psychology, environmentalism, evolutionary biology, and social economics – there has been comparatively little discussion of convergence between them on defining the human–nature relationship. This paper therefore attempts to redefine the human–nature relationship to bring further understanding of humanity’s relationship with the natural environment from an interdisciplinary perspective. The paper also highlights important complex debates both within and across these disciplines.

The central discussion was to explore the interrelationships between the human–nature relationship and its impact on human health. In questioning the causal relationship, this paper addresses existing research on potential adverse and beneficial impacts in relation to humanity’s degree of relationship to nature and lifestyle choices. The paper also acknowledged current gaps and limitations of this link relative to the different types of health (physical, mental, and social), as characterized by the World Health Organization in 1948. Most of these relate to research at the intersect of nature-based parameters and human health being in its relative infancy. It has also been highlighted that the reorientation of health toward a well-being perspective brings its own challenges to the already complex research base in relation to its concept, measurement, and strategic framework. For a deeper sense of understanding and causal directions to be identified requires further attention to the complexities of these aspects’ interlinkages, processes, and relations.

Finally, a developing conceptual model of human and ecosystem health that is inclusive of the human-centered perspective is proposed. It is based on an interdisciplinary outlook at the intersection of the human–nature relationship and human health, addressing the limitations identified in existing models. To achieve this, it combines theoretical concepts and methodological approaches from those research fields examined in this review, bringing a greater depth to data collected. In attempting this, a balance between both rigorous scientific analysis as well as collaborative participatory research will be required, adopting a pragmatic outlook. In this way, an interdisciplinary approach can facilitate a deeper understanding of the complexities involved for attaining optimal health at the human–environmental interface.

Author Contributions

The author confirms being the sole contributor of this work and approved it for publication.

Conflict of Interest Statement

The author declares that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Acknowledgments

The author would like to thank the following people for their advice and feedback during the writing of this manuscript: Muki Haklay, Pippa Bark-Williams, Mike Wood, Peter J. Burt, Catherine Holloway, Jenny Mindell, Claire Ellul, Elizabeth H. Boakes, Gianfranco Gliozzo, Chris Spears, Louisa Hooper, and Roberta Antonica. University College London and The Conservation Volunteers sponsored this research.

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Research Article

Human-nature relationships in context. Experiential, psychological, and contextual dimensions that shape children’s desire to protect nature

Roles Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Investigation, Methodology, Project administration, Validation, Visualization, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

* E-mail: [email protected]

Affiliation Department of Building Engineering, Energy Systems and Sustainability Science, University of Gävle, Gävle, Sweden

• Matteo Giusti

• Published: December 5, 2019
• https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0225951
• Reader Comments

What relationship with nature shapes children’s desire to protect the environment? This study crosses conventional disciplinary boundaries to explore this question. I use qualitative and quantitative methods to analyse experiential, psychological, and contextual dimensions of Human-Nature Connection (HNC) before and after children participate in a project of nature conservation. The results from the interviews (N = 25) suggest that experiential aspects of saving animals enhance children’s appreciation and understanding for animals, nature, and nature conservation. However, the analysis of children’s psychological HNC (N = 158) shows no statistical difference before and after children participate in the project. Analysing the third dimension–children’s contextual HNC–provides further insights. Including children’s contextual relations with home, nature, and city, not only improves the prediction of their desire to work for nature, but also exposes a form of Human-Nature Disconnection (HND) shaped by children’s closeness to cities that negatively influence it. Overall, combining experiential, psychological, and contextual dimensions of HNC provides rich insights to advance the conceptualisation and assessment of human-nature relationships. People’s relationship with nature is better conceived and analysed as systems of relations between mind, body, culture, and environment, which progress through complex dynamics. Future assessments of HNC and HND would benefit from short-term qualitative and long-term quantitative evaluations that explicitly acknowledge their spatial and cultural contexts. This approach would offer novel and valuable insights to promote the psychological and social determinants of resilient sustainable society.

Citation: Giusti M (2019) Human-nature relationships in context. Experiential, psychological, and contextual dimensions that shape children’s desire to protect nature. PLoS ONE 14(12): e0225951. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0225951

Editor: Stefano Federici, Università degli Studi di Perugia, ITALY

Received: April 11, 2019; Accepted: November 15, 2019; Published: December 5, 2019

Copyright: © 2019 Matteo Giusti. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Data Availability: All relevant data are within the manuscript and its Supporting Information files.

Funding: I thank the Formas supported project ZEUS (ref no.: 2016- 01193) granted to S.B. for supporting this work. formas.se.

Competing interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Introduction

Living within sustainable boundaries is a challenge that concerns this and the future generations of humans [ 1 ]. How future generations will develop the desire to protect the environment and live sustainably is a research subject that is receiving exponential attention [ 2 ]. Across environmental and conservation psychology [ 3 , 4 ], landscape management [ 5 , 6 ], biological conservation [ 7 , 8 ] and social-ecological sustainability research [ 9 – 12 ], a personal connection with nature is considered a core determinant for environmental protection and sustainable living. However, many in academia recognise that the ability to appreciate, and eventually protect, the biosphere is threatened by children’s lack of direct nature experiences [ 13 – 16 ] and by the increasing virtualisation of children’s lives [ 17 – 19 ]. These pressures—and the urgent need to create sustainable living standards—are driving a new multidisciplinary arena that investigates how psychological and social determinants of sustainable societies develop in people [ 4 , 20 – 22 ]. Hence, human-nature relationships are studied across many disciplines, but oftentimes disciplinary boundaries limit the valuable integration of the complementary insights produced [ 2 ]. This study addresses this interdisciplinary research gap.

This study aims to advance the conceptualisation and assessment of human-nature relationships to better understand what promotes children’s desire to protect nature. To achieve this aim, this study investigates how participating in a project of nature conservation affects children’s human-nature relationship. In the sections below, I introduce the different dimensions of human-nature relationships that exist within disciplines, I described how the study is designed and the conservation project under examination, and then list the methods used. Afterwards, I describe the results of the study, summarise them in the context of the nature conservation project, and then discuss how they contribute to improving the conceptualisation and assessment of human-nature relationships to better predict children’s desire to work for nature in the future.

Psychological, experiential, and contextual human-nature connection

Human-Nature Connection (HNC) is a concept that emerges from a multidisciplinary review of the body of knowledge on human-nature relationships [ 2 ]. This concept joins three complementary dimensions of human-nature relationships that are often studied in isolation from each other. The first dimension ( psychological HNC ) emerges from research that considers human-nature relationships as an attribute of the mind. This body of literature studies the psychological connection to an abstract form of nature. Changes in people’s connection with nature are measured using quantitative methods often to describe psychological dynamics or to predict specific pro-environmental behaviours (for examples see [ 23 , 24 ]). The second dimension ( experiential HNC ) is representative of qualitative research that describes human-nature relationships as experiences of being in nature. Here, researchers observe and describe people’s interaction with local nature (for example see [ 25 ]). The last dimension ( contextual HNC ) emerges from research on ‘sense of place’ and it investigates human-nature relationships as the sense of belonging that people develop through time with geographical areas. Typically, these studies use questionnaires to study people’s attachment to specific natural landscapes (for review see [ 6 ]).

Despite these psychological, experiential, and contextual dimensions of human-nature relationships being investigated and reported on, single studies usually focus only on one dimension. In doing so, the valuable cross-fertilization across these bodies of knowledge is largely missing [ 2 ]. Beyond the missed opportunity for valuable interdisciplinary insights, disciplinary boundaries have shown to limit the analysis of human-nature relationships. For instance, the predictive power of psychological HNC alone for pro-environmental behaviours is limited when contextual factors are introduced [ 26 – 28 ]. Duffy and Verges [ 26 ] show that seasonal and meteorological factors meaningfully influence people’s association with nature. Contextual influences to psychological HNC are also evident when the RSPB [ 29 ] reports that, somehow counterintuitively, British children are psychologically closer to nature in urban rather than in rural areas. Geographical access to nature experiences is shown to promote children’s psychological HNC [ 30 ], but it stands to question to what kind of nature children develop their appreciation for. Not all nature experiences are equal [ 31 – 33 ] and there is initial indication that different kinds of nature experiences contribute to different aspects of children’s relationship with nature [ 34 ]. This study operationalises, analyses, and discusses the three dimensions of HNC jointly and offers interdisciplinary insights to address some of these limitations.

Study design

Empirically, this study focuses on children. This is because nature experiences during childhood can promote the psychological foundation for a multitude of environmentally conscious behaviours [ 35 – 37 ] and for an adult life devoted to environmental protection [ 38 – 41 ]. In this study, the experiential dimension of HNC is assessed qualitatively after children participate in a project of nature conservation (see section below for details). The impact of this nature experience on children’s psychological and contextual dimensions of HNC is then quantitatively evaluated. This numerical data is analysed to understand what best predicts children’s desire to protect the environment in the future or work for environmental organisations.

The design of this study responds to the need to analyse all dimensions of HNC simultaneously, by using a multi-method approach on a large dataset of participants in combination with some control over socio-demographic factors [ 42 ]. This design addresses two critiques common to retrospective research on nature experiences: first, participants have a nearly identical socio-cultural background (e.g. age, level of education, and culture) and, second, they are assessed when memories are still vivid [ 43 ]. This multi-dimensional and interdisciplinary investigation provides a set of results useful to discuss the constituents of human-nature relationships and to debate what shapes children’s desire to protect nature.

The salamander project

The Salamander Project (SP) is a voluntary program of nature conservation involving 10-year-old students who attend a municipal school in the outskirts of Stockholm (Sweden). These students are responsible for saving and documenting two endangered species of salamanders. During every school day from April to May, a group of 5 to 8 children walk to a local park guided by a schoolteacher. Every time the group of children is likely to be different. In the park, there is a dry paddling pool in which salamanders frequently fall in to on their way to a nearby breeding ground, remain trapped, dry, and consequently die. So, participating in the SP means that children go into the dry pool, look for salamanders, pick them up out of the pool by hand, document species and gender, and then release the salamanders into the nearby pond where they can reproduce. All children from the 4 th grade in this school are invited to participate, but participation is voluntary. Still, the SP is a flagship of pride for this school and children usually participate happily. Overall, the SP is an authentic project of nature conservation [ 44 ] with documented ecological success [ 45 , 46 ] and it is not conceived by the school as a pedagogical activity. Nonetheless, the SP has inherent educational value for children as Barthel et al. [ 44 ] have documented.

Participants

Participants are 158 (85 males, 73 females) 10-year-old students attending three schools in Stockholm. Only one school takes part in the SP. The two schools not partaking in the SP act as control groups to ensure a balanced number of subjects between control and treatment groups. These schools are within 3 kilometres of each other to maintain social-economic factors and spatial access to natural environments outside the SP nearly constant. All schools are recruited via personal contacts and phone calls and they decide to participate in the study to know more about their pupils’ relationship with nature.

Participants attending one school (N = 67, 3 classes) partake in the SP, whereas the students attending the other two schools do not participate (N = 91, 4 classes). Of the 67 children partaking in the SP, 25 children are interviewed after participating in the SP. This group of children is recruited on voluntary basis. However, the final selection is made to ensure that this group is equally distributed across the three classes involved in the SP, that there is equal gender representation (12 males, 13 females), and that there is variety in the number of times children directly participate in collecting salamander (2 to 5 times).

Experiential HNC.

Experiential HNC is assessed by interviewing children after they participate in the SP. The interviews follow an interview guide that focuses on what children think and feel about the SP, salamanders, animals, and nature in general ( S1 Appendix ).

Psychological HNC.

In order to evaluate different, and potentially complementary, aspects of psychological HNC, I assess both ‘connection to nature’ [ 47 ] and ‘connectedness with nature’ in its explicit (i.e. available to consciousness) and implicit (i.e. outside of conscious awareness) form [ 48 , 49 ]. These concepts refer to independent methods to assess psychological HNC. Connection to nature is assessed using the Connection to Nature Index (CNI) from Cheng and Monroe [ 47 ]. This is known to be a reliable tool to use with 10-year-old children alike the participants in the study [ 50 – 53 ]. In addition, I revise four items from the CNI subscale ‘empathy for creatures’ to assess exclusively empathy for salamanders (hereinafter called salamander empathy ) ( S2 and S3 Appendix). The scale salamander empathy is created to capture potential emotional changes specifically towards salamanders since the SP focuses on saving these animals.

Explicit connectedness with nature is assessed using the Inclusion of Nature in Self scale (INS) [ 49 ], because its graphical form ( Fig 1A ) is easy to understand for children [ 53 – 55 ] and because it reports consistent results over time [ 56 ]. This method can also be considered an assessment of children’s self-nature closeness [ 57 ]. Implicit connectedness with nature is assessed using a computerized Implicit Association Test called FlexiTwins [ 48 ]. This is a videogame that measures how quickly children can associate with words representing the built environment or representing nature. How much faster children’s reaction times are with words representing nature is an indication of their implicit association with nature. FlexiTwins is chosen because it can reduce biased results, given that children might be incapable to fully articulate their association with nature [ 56 , 58 , 59 ]. FlexiTwins is already used in studies with young people [ 48 , 60 ].

• PPT PowerPoint slide
• PNG larger image
• TIFF original image

The four diagrams used to assess children’s: self-nature closeness (i.e. INS) (a), self-city closeness (b), home-nature closeness (c), home-city closeness (d).

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0225951.g001

Lastly, after the treatment group participated in the SP, all participating children answer in written form to the question: “Would you like to work to protect nature or in environmental projects in the future?”. All the above material is translated to Swedish to make it accessible to Swedish children (see S2 and S3 Appendix).

Contextual HNC.

The analysis of the contextual dimension of HNC is based on understanding relations among four concepts: self , nature , home , and city . In other words, it means understanding how children perceive themselves, and their homes, integrated in the concepts of nature and city. Home is unanimously considered the place to which people attach the most meaning [ 61 ]. Home is the context people use as a reference point to construct reality in their daily life [ 62 ]. In an extensive review of sense of place literature, Lewicka [ 6 ] writes: “Home is a symbol of continuity and order, rootedness, self-identity, attachment, privacy, comfort, security and refuge”. How nature is integrated in the concept of home, is a contextual relation worth exploring to understand how contextual HNC influence children’s desire to work for nature.

Another central concept for contextual HNC is city. Cities are amongst humankind’s greatest inventions and amongst the biggest challenges to sustainability [ 63 ]. They are worth names and they are elements of pride and conflicts in the history of humankind [ 6 , 64 ]. However, they have the peculiarity of being environments exclusively constructed for human use, from which natural dynamics are mostly separated and hidden [ 65 ]. Thus, how children perceive themselves and their homes in relation to the concept of city is crucial to unveil how their attachment to this context might shape their relationship with nature and influence their desire to work for nature.

The contextual dimensions of HNC are analysed with three variants of the Inclusion of Other in the Self scale [ 57 ] and three sets of questions. First, I use seven pairs of increasingly overlapping circles to quantify children’s self-city closeness ( Fig 1B ), home-nature closeness ( Fig 1C ), and home-city closeness ( Fig 1D ). This scale is the same as the one used to assess self-nature closeness, or INS, in the assessment of psychological HNC. Additionally, children are asked to answer in written form to three questions for each context selected (i.e. city , home , nature ): “what does [city/home/nature] mean to you?”, “what is best about [city/home/nature]?”, and “what is worst about [city/home/nature]?”. These questions unpack the mental representations that children use when they are asked about their closeness to nature and city, and their home-nature and home-city closeness. Unfolding the attributes that constitutes children’s home , nature , and city allows investigating the set of meanings that form the foundation of children’s contextual HNC. All children’s written answers are coded using a thematic analysis. All the material above is translated to Swedish to make it accessible to Swedish children (see S2 and S3 Appendix).

Children’s experiential HNC is assessed through interviews within one week from participating in the SP (June 2015). All interviews are held in Swedish at the school during school time and they last about 10 minutes each. They are recorded, transcribed, and inductively coded using Atlas.ti following the systematic process described by Braun and Clarke [ 66 ].

Psychological and contextual HNC.

Children’s psychological and contextual HNC are assessed at the school that children attend during school hours using printed material. Participants receive brief oral instructions about the content of the activity and then are provided with a printed booklet for the assessment ( S3 Appendix ). All children are given sufficient time to complete the whole assessment in a reasonably distraction-free environment. After completing all written questions in the booklet, children are asked to move to a computer lab, or use laptops, to play an offline version of FlexiTwins. This assessment is performed on all children twice: before some of them participate in the SP (April 2015) and after (June 2015).

Ethical protocol

The ethical protocol of this study has been approved by the responsible ethical committee (Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University). The author had a background police check which was provided to all schools before fieldwork. All participants’ parents or guardians received an informative letter about the study and provided written consent to allow children to participate in the study. This consent allowed the author to record the interviews, analyse results, and utilise quotes from the interviews anonymously. The names reported in the quotes are fictional.

Experiential HNC

The results from interviews suggest that (i) all 25 children interviewed perceive salamanders in a different light after participating in the SP. In the eyes of these children, salamanders are now associated with aesthetic pleasure, feelings of care, empathy, and respect. Children wonder where salamanders are at night, how they feel, and what kind of life they have. In other words, children show the capacity to imagine what the life of a salamander is, and show concern for their livelihoods. The quotes below represent this finding.

“I have started to like them and I know now that you have to be careful with them.” (Sky) “I had seen a salamander before (…) but I didn’t know so much about them. And now it feels like ‘Oh, I want to have my own salamander’! They are so smooth and soft! (…) They are so nice!” (Ellie) “First I felt, well … how can I explain? ‘Yeah it’s exciting but they are …like …just salamanders’. But now I feel more like, they are alive, they exist. Before I didn’t think ‘I wonder where they are.’ […] I care more about them.” (Loreta) “I have more […] respect for how they live because it’s quite … I wouldn’t survive if I were a salamander! … Now I see them in a different way. Before I thought they were like animals. Now it’s like they are beings that, well, they need help, just like people can need help sometimes.” (Roberto)

These changes are not limited to children’s relation to salamanders. By immediate generalization, children transpose these insights to others animals. Most children state that participating in the SP has altered their relations to animals and nature in general, as the quotes below show.

“I have started to think more about animals and nature. Actually a lot more than what I did before.” (Ale) “That you shouldn’t harm them because they are also animals and they often live a hard life.” (Quentin) “Yes, well, I have much more of a sense for nature.” (Megan) “Well, it’s like I’m less scared and I feel … more confident in nature.” (Stephan)

Notably, children’s narratives repeatedly report a specific formative moment. The emotional reaction linked to finding salamanders is often associated with overcoming, what I call here, the ‘yuck barrier’ (ii). Once a child finds a salamander, it is his or her responsibility to collect it by hand and determine species and gender. Many children say that before participating in the SP they thought that holding a salamander is simply ‘yuck’, and this emotional threshold kept them from touching, or even considering touching, these animals. However, participating in the SP puts them in a position of responsibility that forces them to overcome this emotional barrier, as the quotes below show.

“They were like this little slimy, I didn’t dare to hold it, but now I feel like, now I can hold one without a problem.” (Liz) “The first time it was a little scary. I'm a little afraid of animals so then it was a bit scary, if it would bite me or how it would feel if it was on my hands. It was a little nerve-racking the first time. […] Then it was completely normal.” (Filippo)

All children are enthusiastic about participating in the SP. Moreover, the first-hand experience of saving the life of a salamander makes them understand the moral rationale that underpins nature conservation, as the quote below shows.

“I have learnt to take care of animals. I'm maybe thinking about doing something like that maybe …to fix things so that everything is good with nature. (…) Yes …I have become more nature-friendly.” (Johan)

Collectively, these results show that participating in the SP changes children’s relation to salamanders, other animals, and nature in general. The importance of the SP in shaping children’s relationship with nature is also confirmed in a follow-up study with the same children two years after they participated in the SP [ 44 ].

Psychological and contextual HNC

The statistical analyses of psychological and contextual HNC are presented together because they share the same quantitative methodology and because they provide similar insights.

Data screening.

All data from FlexiTwins have to be screened for consistency following a standard procedure prior to analysis (for details see [ 60 ]). Consequently, all participants’ results that have error rates above 65% (n = 21) or that have inconsistent scores within the two phases of the same session (n = 27) are deleted. Overall, 48 of the 158 participants are excluded from the analysis. This is a representative outcome for 10-year-old participants outside laboratory conditions. Children’s excitement of playing a videogame and comparing their performances undermine the focus that FlexiTwins requires to obtain accurate results.

Data overview.

The software R [ 67 ] is used to perform ANOVA tests and independent t-tests on the psychological and contextual dimensions of HNC. The data are reported with p-values between 0.1 and 0.9 as nonsignificant, whereas other results are interpreted according to their p-values, effect size, and in terms of scientific importance and relevance [ 68 , 69 ]. Table 1 shows an overview of the resulting data. The main results are presented separately in the following sections.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0225951.t001

Baseline differences.

There are no baseline differences across schools or classes between control and treatment groups for any of the methods employed for contextual HNC (p>.1 for home-nature, self-city, and home-city closeness). There are also no baseline differences for the methods employed for psychological HNC (p>.1 for CNI and self-nature closeness), but for FlexiTwins (p = .053, d = .39) and salamander empathy (p = .002, d = .55). For FlexiTwins, that means that the control group has a higher implicit association with nature than the treatment group, but the difference is moderate and statistically weak. For salamander empathy, that means that empathy towards salamanders is higher in children who will participate but have not yet participated in the SP (iii). In this case, the difference is quite large and statistically strong.

Impact of participating in the Salamander Project.

There are no statistical differences before and after children participated in the SP for any of the methods employed for psychological or contextual HNC (p>.1 for FlexiTwins, CNI, salamander empathy, self-nature, home-nature, self-city, and home-city closeness). Additional t-tests calculated on the mean difference between pre-SP and post-SP confirm these results. These results suggest that participating in the SP does not influence children’s psychological or contextual HNC (iv).

Gender differences.

There are statistical differences due to gender in both sessions of assessment. Females show significantly higher psychological and contextual HNC than males (v). This is true for all the quantitative methods employed (.094<p < .001). The differences range from small for contextual HNC (0.20<d<0.26 for home-nature, self-city, and home-city closeness), to moderate for self-nature closeness (d = 0.34), FlexiTwins (d = 0.39), and salamander empathy (d = 0.46), and large for CNI (d = 0.69).

Meanings of city , home , and nature .

The thematic analysis of how children describe the concepts of city , home , and nature produces 34 themes reported more than 1000 times ( Fig 2 ). These themes are valuable insights into what children assume city, home, and nature to be when they are asked about their relations with such concepts in psychometric analysis. For instance, children do not conceive the concept of city in terms of geographical size, urban density, or trading opportunities, but the 10 most frequently reported themes are: shop (84), fumes (54), people (41), pollution (32), car (30) activities (28), fun (25), things (21), no nature (14), and friends (13). These are the themes the constitute the concept of city to which children are more or less close to. Differently, the 10 most frequent themes for home are: family (60), living (35), nature (34), room (28), house (25), animals (23), things (20), safety (19), messy (13), and peace (13). Lastly, the 10 most frequently reported themes that construct children’s concept of nature are: animals (94), plants (65), pollution (31), danger (26), nice (25), play (23), fun (21), peace (20), fresh air (19), freedom (16), and love (16). These results show that what children mean by city, home, and nature is a collection of meaningful everyday activities (e.g. shopping, living, playing), social contexts (e.g. people, family, friends), and emotions (e.g. fun, safety, peace) (vi).

The themes are reported more than three times. The size of the words is weighted for how many times the theme reoccurs in children’s answers.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0225951.g002

Predicting children’s desire to work for nature

All children answer the question about their desire to work for nature by writing yes, no, or maybe (N-no = 19; N-maybe = 48; N-yes = 75). In line with all other methods, females show a higher desire to work for nature than males (p < .001, d = 0.66) (v). This difference is large and very significant. A correlation analysis ( Fig 3A ) shows that children’s desire to work for nature significantly correlates with CNI (p = 0.42), self-nature closeness (p = 0.31), home-nature closeness (p = 0.28), salamander empathy (p = 0.28), and FlexiTwins (p = 0.15), but it correlates negatively with home-city (p = -0.37), and self-city closeness (p = -0.37).

(a) Spearman correlation table for all quantitative methods employed. Crossed elements are non-significant (p>.1). The strength of correlations is reported in the upper triangle. (b) Two-dimensional visualization of coordinates obtained from the principal component analysis for children’s desire to work for nature.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0225951.g003

Bartlett’s sphericity test shows that the data are adequate for factor analysis (p<2.2e-16). The consequent principal component analysis shows that the majority of variance in this set of variables is explained by two opposing factors ( Fig 3B and Table 2 ). In order to investigate the opposing drivers at play in how children learn the desire to work for nature, and because FlexiTwins, self-nature, and CNI are similar conceptualisations of one’s relationship with nature, I choose to further analyse two sets of composite variables. The first one, termed Human-Nature Connection (HNC), includes all variables that positively correlate to children’s desire to work for nature: CNI, self-nature closeness, home-nature closeness, salamander empathy, and FlexiTwins. The second one, termed Human-Nature Disconnection (HND), includes the two variables that negatively correlates to children’s desire to work for nature: self-city and home-city closeness.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0225951.t002

The factors HND and HNC are treated as latent constructs in the structural equation model called HND-HNC model ( Fig 4C ). The HND-HNC model is compared to other three to appreciate which one offers the best fit for predicting children’s desire to work for nature ( Fig 4 ). The first comparative model is the measurement model, which predicts children’s desire to work for nature by using only observed variables. The second comparative model ( CTN model ) introduces a latent construct based on psychological conceptualisations of people’s relationship with nature ( Fig 4A ). The third comparative model ( HNC model) integrates positive contextual relations with children’s psychological HNC ( Fig 4B ).

a) CTN model; b) HNC model; c) HND-HNC model. Latent variables are in circles, measured variables in rectangles, and the lines show standardized parameter estimates.

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Following the guidelines provided by Awang [ 70 ], I use multiple fit indices to evaluate the good fit of the models (p-value, CFI, RMSEA, GIF, chisq/df) and to compare them with each other (chisq/df, AIC, BIC). The analysis of fitness and comparison of all models is summarized in Table 3 . The analysis of fitness shows that the measurement model does not fit the data (p>.5, CFI < .9, RMSEA>.08, chisq/df>3.0). The CTN model has almost acceptable fit to the data (RMSEA>.08), whereas both HNC and HND-HNC models have a good fit to the data. In all models, all standardized parameter coefficients, but FlexiTwins (.116<p< .199) are very significant (p < .001). The fit indices show that integrating home-nature closeness in the CTN model to contextualise children’s positive relationship with nature improves the fit of the data for all indices (see RMSEA, chisq/df, AIC, and BIC in Table 3 between CTN and HNC model) (vii). However, across all indices, the best model to predict children’s desire to work for nature is the HND-HNC model. In this model, self-city and home-city closeness are indicators of a relationship with nature that is negatively linked to children’s desire to work for nature (viii). Additionally, in the HND-HNC model the percentage of explained variance for children’s desire to work for nature passes from 32.7% (CTN model), and 31.7% (HNC model), to 47.2% (HND-HNC model).

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0225951.t003

Summary of results

The aim of this paper is to advance the conceptualisation and assessment of human-nature relationships to better understand the premises of children’s desire to protect nature. In summary, the results show that:

• Experiencing the SP enables children to imagine what the life of a salamander is, to feel empathy and concern for them and other animals, and to appreciate the reasoning behind actions of nature conservation.
• Children’s relationship with salamanders changes drastically once they overcome the fear of touching the first salamander (‘yuck’ barrier).
• Children who attend the school responsible for the SP have higher empathy towards salamanders than children who don’t, even before participating in the SP.
• The quantitative methods used to assess children’s psychological and contextual HNC cannot distinguish between a child who participated in the SP and a child who did not.
• Female children show higher values across all indicators of psychological and contextual HNC, and higher desire to work for nature than male children.
• What children mean by home , nature , and city is a collection of meaningful everyday activities, social contexts, and emotions.
• Integrating contextual with psychological factors of HNC improves the prediction of children’s desire to work for nature.
• Self-city and home-city closeness represent a Human Nature Disconnection (HND) that is negatively linked to children’s desire to work for nature.

Overall, the SP seems to be a formative experience for children’s relationship with nature even if the changes in how children value salamanders, animals, and nature in general could not quantified. The SP shares many conditions that characterize the most effective programs in environmental education: occurring over an extended period of time, learning about environmental issues and practising action skills, experiencing and taking ownership of environmental issues, and participating with role models [ 71 ]. Accordingly, the interviews suggest that participating in the SP achieves many targets of successful environmental education: ecological knowledge, environmental awareness, practical skills, environmental attitudes and intentions, and enjoyment of the experience [ 50 , 72 ].

Yet, there is a visible discrepancy between the results of the interviews and the assessment of psychological and contextual HNC. Psychological and contextual HNC do not change after children participate in the SP. Regardless of the unexplored and potentially speculative motivations for this discrepancy, recognising such discrepancy is further testimony to the value of interdisciplinary approaches to HNC. Identifying this discrepancy hints that in order to better conceive children’s relationship with nature and understand the premises of their desire to protect nature, HNC has to be operationalised, analysed, and discussed jointly from a multitude of disciplinary perspectives. The aim of this paper is to do exactly so and the results of this study promotes such opportunity.

In the sections below, I combine the findings above to advance future operationalisations and assessments of human-nature relationships. The interdisciplinary findings of this study- with the associated roman numeral in the list above—are discussed in three following sections: conceptualizing human-nature relationships; assessing human-nature relationships, and children’s desire to work for nature and the everyday habitat.

Conceptualizing human-nature relationships

The interdisciplinary analysis of the results suggests two properties of human-nature relationships that are core characteristics of system thinking [ 73 ] and embodied ontologies [ 74 , 75 ]. First, HNC and HND can be interpreted as systems of meaningful relations between mind, body, culture, and environment. Second, they seem to progress non-linearly through complex dynamics with potential delays between causes and effects. In the sections below, I discuss how the findings of this study suggest these two properties.

HNC and HND as systems of meaningful relations.

Most conceptualisations of HNC commonly suggest a separation between mind, body, and spatial and cultural context [ 2 ]. Several findings of this study indicate that this separation is arbitrary and limiting. For instance, this study shows that integrating contextual relations between self, home, nature, and city predict better children’s desire to work for nature than using psychological factors alone (vii). Home-nature and home-city closeness contextualise children’s HNC in the local space and culture. This means that children’s relationship with nature can predict their desire to work for nature better when it is spatially and socially contextualised. This result is supported by many in sense of place literature. Place attachment is a known driver for actions of nature conservation [ 6 , 76 ] and Masterson et al. [ 77 ] suggest that nature protective social norms are inherently embedded in a place. Moreover, Kyle at al. [ 78 ] state that a sense of connection with a space is also function of the value attributed to the social relations in that space. Children’s HNC can be conceived as a system of relations between themselves and their context.

This study also shows that contextual relations can hamper, rather than promote, children’s desire to work for nature (viii). I aggregated these relations in what I preliminary called Human-Nature Disconnection (HND). HND is children’s identification with a system of meanings that demotivate their desire to work for nature. The thematic analysis suggests that those meanings relate to personal closeness to shopping, urban activities, or cars (vi). HND is further indication that human-nature relationships embed spatial and social context. Including the systems of positive and negative contextual meanings predicts children’s desire to work for nature more appropriately (vii).

HNC and HND are conceptually similar to the opposing categories of biophilia and biophobia [ 79 ]. Biophilia is an affinity with specific attributes of the natural world that human beings have developed throughout evolution [ 80 ]. Conversely, phobic situations involve spiders, snakes, heights, or other attributes that have posed dangers to humans throughout evolution [ 79 ]. Like biophilia and biophobia, HNC and HND develop through time—albeit on a shorter time scale than human evolution—shaping appreciation or repulsion for future nature-related experiences. It could be said that HNC and HND are systems of meaningful human-nature relations acquired through personal living that supplement the biophilic and biophobic relations acquired through evolution.

Inseparable interdependencies between self and context in human-nature relationships are also supported by another result of this study (iii). A salamander-friendly culture is the social background of only those children who attend the school responsible for the SP. In this school, children are indirectly and unconsciously exposed to a culture of acceptance and appreciation towards salamanders. This social context coincides with higher levels of empathy towards salamanders even before children participate in the SP (iii). However, participating in the SP does not further increment such empathy (iv). This result should not be considered a failing of the program, nor a failing of the methods used, but an additionally indication that children’s relationship with nature is context dependent and it is not solely identifiable through psychological analysis. These findings suggest that in this situation children’s empathy towards salamanders is more indicative of a social background than of a psychological trait.

Relational and systemic properties of can be also found in the meaning of the very concept of nature –as well as in the concepts of home and city . Children’s meaning of nature is a meaningful agglomeration of everyday activities, social contexts, and emotions (vi). Nature, in children’s minds, is not an abstract and universal concept as assumed by psychometric measurements, but a system of meaningful relations that includes physical environments (e.g. plants, animals, and fresh air), emotions (e.g. fun, peace), actions (e.g. play), and culture (e.g. freedom). This personal system of relations is what children connect to and it is what they consider when they reply to psychometric surveys like the CNI and INS used in this study. Implicitly, assessing children’s ‘enjoyment of nature’ (CNI) or closeness to nature (INS) means assessing attachment to a contextualised system of relations that embeds natural spaces and shared social values. Hence, psychological HNC is different when its geographical and cultural context is different. Not only nature experiences are embedded in social and political contexts as Clayton et al. [ 32 ] advocate, but this study also suggests that the emerging human-nature relationship is inseparable from its spatial and cultural context.

The last results that support a relational and systemic interpretation of human-nature relationships are those related to gender differences. Across all quantitative methods used, females have higher nature connection, lower disconnection, and are more inclined to work to protect the environment than males (v). These results echo many other studies that find that females have stronger pro-environmental attitudes and behaviours than men [ 81 – 86 ]. Whether for biological or cultural reasons, these results imply strong interdependencies between mind, body, and culture that should be taken into account when conceptualising human-nature relationships. Otto et al. [ 87 ] shows that environmental attitudes are also a function of people’s age. They report that environmental attitudes develop during childhood, consolidate during teenage years, and then decline. This means that the same level of psychological HNC has different interpretations given one’s age, which implies once more that environmental attitudes are embodied in one’s body.

In summary, this study suggest that human-nature relationships are better defined as systems of meaningful relations between mind, body, culture, and environment that can promote (HNC) or hamper (HND) sustainable living. Conceptualising human-nature relationship as systems of embodied relations enables such relationships to be categorised and investigated in new ways. For instance, one could distinguish between systems of child-animals relationships, female-forest relationships, or people-biosphere relationships and eventually explore their role to promote or hamper sustainable living. Operationalising human-nature relationships using embodied ontologies [ 74 , 88 ] and system approaches [ 73 ] raises new research questions of high value for future sustainable societies. For example, what are the synergies between gender equality and sustainable mindsets? Which spatial configuration of the human habitat best promote children’s relationship with nature? And—noting existing relations between certain cultural products and social preferences and HND [ 89 , 90 ]—which social contexts hamper environmental attitudes and sustainable living? Giusti et al. [ 34 ] show that professionals in the field of connecting children to nature explain HNC as a set of abilities that children can learn when given the appropriate spatial and social circumstances. Considering human-nature relationships as systems of meaningful relations between mind, body, culture, and environment would also align academic knowledge with professionals’ wisdom.

HNC and HND progresses through complex dynamics.

Current literature mostly proposes linear growth for psychological [ 91 ] and contextual [ 6 ] dimensions of HNC. Conversely, in line with Otto et al. [ 87 ] and Vining and Merrick [ 33 ], this study suggests that human-nature relationships evolve following complex dynamics with potential delays between causes and effects. For instance, the contributors to children’s desire to work for nature shown in this study are not all positive (viii). The system of relations shaping HNC is in conflict with the system of relations shaping HND when children consider working for nature in the future. That means that human-nature relationships cannot be evaluated as one linear progression from disconnection to connection. At any given point in time a degree of connection and a degree of disconnection co-exist and they promote, or not, sustainable living. Similarly, biophobic attitudes co-exist with biophilic attributes. As this study shows, children’s desire to work for nature in this study is affected not only by the strength of positive relations, but also by the weakness of their negative relations (viii). The progression of HNC and HND and their eventual contribution to sustainable living is therefore dictated by the complex, and conflicting, interactions of their meanings (vi).

Overcoming the ‘yuck barrier’ is another indicator that human-nature relationships follow complex rather than linear dynamics (ii). This experience is similar to what is known as ‘environmental epiphany’ [ 33 ]. Before the SP, salamanders are “ …just salamanders ” (Loreta). After the SP, salamanders are considered animals with feelings, pain, and life struggles to which children can relate (i). This is not a linear increment in children’s HNC, but a transformative change in the structure that shape their relationship with nature. After overcoming the ‘yuck barrier’, children rely on new relations between their body (first time holding a salamanders), mind (appreciation rather than disgust), and context (new support from peers). This new system of relations is consolidated in memory [ 44 ] and enables them to approach and appreciate a whole new set of nature situations, actions, emotions, and behaviours in the future. This dynamic is a clear example of the embodied progression of children’s HNC proposed by Giusti et al. [ 34 ]. Children’s HNC progresses from being comfortable with salamanders (i.e. touching salamanders) to enjoy interact with them (i.e. document species and gender) to being able to care for them (i.e. feeling care and concern). Ultimately, the ‘yuck barrier’ is an indication of non-linear dynamics that further challenges disembodied conceptualisations of HNC and HND.

Assessing human-nature relationships

The insights from the multi-dimensional and multi-method investigation performed in this study suggest several ways to improve future assessments of human-nature relationships. One salient result is that the impact of participating in the SP on children’s HNC could not be quantified with the tools used here (iv). Despite children saying that they have “ become more nature-friendly ” (Johan) and “ have much more of a sense for nature ” (Megan), the psychometric methods used do not report any statistical difference in how children enjoy, feel empathy, or feel connected to nature. In short, none of these tools could distinguish between a child who participated in the SP from a child who did not (iv). This discrepancy in assessments is a major obstacle for any educational activity that is designed to promote children’s HNC and that requires an evaluation of its effectiveness. Below, I present some limitations of the methods used here and discuss potential ways to improve future assessments of human-nature relationships.

Despite being a child-friendly videogame, FlexiTwins has limitations when applied to real-world situations with children. First, the level of attention required to generate accurate results is incompatible with groups of children. In this paper, 30% of the participants’ scores have to be discarded because they are inconsistent or because of high error rates. Second, despite paying a considerable amount of attention to the selection of words used in FlexiTwins, previous research suggests that results might also be influenced by the translation to Swedish, the valence of the words chosen, and the cultural and geographical nuances associated with such words [ 27 , 92 ].

The assessment of children’s psychological HNC allows for further considerations. The group of children in the school responsible for the SP shows significantly higher empathy towards salamanders than the control group, even before participating in the project (iii). Yet, the subscale ‘empathy towards animals’ in the CNI, from which the scale ‘salamander empathy’ is created does not. These results suggest that the generality and de-contextualization of existing psychometric scales impede the identification of changes in psychological HNC. As salamanders are not as intangible as the whole animal kingdom, ‘salamander empathy’ efficiently identifies a pre-existing condition of greater association whereas ‘empathy towards animals’ does not. Children show that what they mean by nature includes emotions (fun, peace, love), actions (playing), and culture (freedom). The abstract, ambiguous, and impersonal concept of nature predominantly used in the literature to assess human-nature relationships [ 2 ] might be a strong limiting factor of existing psychometric assessments.

Those limitations are recognised in the literature [ 42 , 93 ]. These methods are often validated within laboratory conditions [ 4 , 94 ], in relation to self-reported environmental behaviours [ 95 ], and they can often be considered markers of an overarching construct [ 91 ]. Thus, it stands to question if the available psychometric measurements can measure the psychological predictors of environmental actions and sustainable living in real-world situations. There is no clear answer to this question yet. Following the results of this study, the assessment of psychological HNC alone is limited by the operationalisation of abstract and de-contextualised concepts. Considering that human’s existence is dominated by automatic decisional processes [ 96 ] and is embedded in space and culture [ 9 ], the potential of psychological assessments of human-nature relationships to predict valuable environmental actions and sustainable living might be limited.

These limitations can be addressed in a few ways. First, by taking into consideration the temporal dimension of HNC and HND. Quantitative methods show low accuracy when they assess real-world situations that operate in short time frames [ 27 , 28 , 42 ]. However, short nature experiences such as the SP might still influence children’s HNC, as suggested by the interviews here (i), but the effects of such changes might be quantifiable only after longer time. Temporal delays between causes and effects are common in system dynamics [ 73 ]. Psychometric tools have shown important results when assessing the impact of nature routines [ 13 , 34 ], so they might be more suited for long-term evaluations. Second, exploring which and what kind of spatial and social relations promote or hamper human-nature relationships can be achieved using inductive methodologies. For instance, ethnographic assessments of nature experiences, as in Elliot et al. [ 28 ], and qualitative explorations of the system of relational meanings that constitute HNC and HND might offer novel insights in how to develop quantitative and contextualised methods of assessments. Third, human-nature relationships not only increase or decrease, but they combine (as HNC and HND do for children’s desire to work for nature) and transform (as by overcoming the ‘yuck barrier’) in context. As already suggested elsewhere [ 34 ], different stages of development for human-nature relationships might exist. This implies that assessing human-nature relationships cannot rely solely on single and linear pre-defined indicators. Multi-methods evaluations should become the norm to assess human-nature relationships. Ultimately, to overcome the limitations listed above assessments should start from the premise of contextualised, embodied, and systemic conceptualisations of human-nature relationships.

Children’s desire to work for nature and the everyday habitat

From the results of this study is possible to draw some insights about the premises of children’s desire to protect nature and how they can be promoted. Human-nature relationships are often assumed in the literature to be predictors for environmental actions or sustainable living. This is the case whether the predicted outcome is actions of nature conservation [ 14 ], sustainable futures [ 9 ], or specific pro-environmental behaviours [ 97 – 100 ]. This study contributes to this literature with new insights what promotes or hampers children’s desire to protect the environment. In this study, contextualising children’s relationship with nature in space and culture improves the prediction of their desire to work for nature by about 15% (vii, viii). This prediction comprises the negative influence of children’s closeness to shopping, urban activities, and cars, or indifference to pollution and fumes (vi). This model is, by some margin, the best one to explain the premises of children’s commitment, even if hypothetical, to environmental actions (viii).

These results suggest that the everyday habitat might hamper children’s motivation to protect the biosphere. However, the opposite is also true. Children in the school responsible for the SP show high levels of empathy towards salamanders (iii). This implies that the everyday social and spatial habitat can also promote human-nature relationships favourable to environmental actions or sustainable living. This is also supported by other studies on nature routines [ 13 ]. The conscious and unconscious interactions with natural elements occurring in children’s lives form the basis of their nature routines. Nature-rich or nature-poor routines are embedded in children’s everyday habitat and they either promote or hamper children’s desire to protect nature. It follows that if the goal is to understand the predictors of sustainable actions, lifestyles, and cultures more attention should be paid to qualities of the everyday human habitat.

It follows that changing the everyday human habitat should form a central part of any interventions to promote environmental actions and sustainable living. Ensuring a spatial and cultural context suitable for sustainable living is as important as–if not more–individuals’ education. Literature in environmental education recognises this need to shift from indoor individual learning to outdoor community building [ 101 , 102 ]. The spatial human habitat can be designed to be a constant reminder of what a sustainable relationship with nature entails. The literature on biophilic design [ 103 ] and nature-connecting habitats [ 104 , 105 ] rests exactly on this conviction. Spatial and cultural interventions on the human habitat have great potential to enable the kind of human-nature relationships required for sustainable living.

Many in academia suggest that human-nature relationships can be used as a tool to transform human’s unsustainable trends of development [ 11 , 12 ]. The results of this study counter the common assumption that only one sustainable human-nature relationship exists and that can be universally measured. De-contextualizing human-nature relationships from culture and space has created an array of useful and valid psychometric measurements that are however limited when applied to real-world situations. The findings of this study emphasize the embodied, contextual, and systemic properties of children’s relationship with nature. The results suggest that human-nature relationships are better defined as systems of meaningful relationships between mind, body, culture, and environment that can promote (i.e. HNC) or hamper (i.e. HND) sustainable living. These systems of relations likely progress through complex dynamics in which the everyday spatial and social habitat plays a major role.

Future operationalisations of HNC and HND would profit from adopting embodied ontologies [ 74 , 75 ] and system thinking [ 73 ], as exemplified by the concepts of embodied ecosystems [ 88 ] and existing research on children’s HNC [ 34 ]. Accordingly, future assessments of children’s relationship with nature would benefit from mixed-methods approaches that explicitly acknowledge the defining role of spatial and cultural contexts. This can be performed through a combination of short-term qualitative and long-term quantitative assessments. Analysing children’s nature routines and their everyday habitat are research efforts of particular promising value to understand the predictors of environmental actions and sustainable living. In conclusion, conceiving and operationalising human-nature relationships as systems of relations would provide novel and valuable insights to promote the psychological and social determinants of resilient sustainable societies.

Supporting information

S1 appendix. interview guide..

Interview guide used in this study to assess children’s experiential dimension of HNC.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0225951.s001

S2 Appendix. Booklet used for assessment (English).

Translation in English of the booklet used in this study to assess children’s psychological and contextual dimensions of HNC.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0225951.s002

S3 Appendix. Booklet used for assessment (Swedish).

Booklet used in this study to assess children’s psychological and contextual dimensions of HNC.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0225951.s003

S1 data. Csv data file.

Data utilised for the statistical analysis.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0225951.s004

Acknowledgments

I thank Louise Chawla, Stephan Barthel, Therese Lindhal, and Elena Dawkins for comments on previous versions of the manuscript, and the reviewers for their constructive feedback.

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• How can zoos and aquariums foster cultures of care and conservation?

Pathways to Connectedness

• By Wesley Schultz

4 minutes of reading

Humans have a fundamental and primitive connection with nature. Throughout our short tenure on this planet, humans have adapted to survive in nature. For nearly all of human history, the survival of an individual depended on his or her knowledge of the local environment and ability to find resources, stave off predators, and ultimately to raise children who themselves could survive. Because of these adaptive pressures, individuals are bred to be part of nature, and our connection with nature is undeniable.

While connectedness with nature was fundamental to our survival in the past, modern technologies have made it possible to survive with little or no contact with nature. In industrialized countries around the world, life goes on without nature. We live, work, play, socialize, and spend the overwhelming portions of our day in a built and increasingly virtual environment. Our experiences with nature—and even with each other—are mediated by technology. But connectedness with nature persists, and it manifests through our thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. While we can survive today without much exposure to nature, our bodies and minds are adapted to a natural environment and will thrive in connection with nature.

I use the term connectedness here in a very specific and deliberate way. It refers to the extent to which an individual views him or herself as part of nature, rather than separate from nature. People who view themselves as connected with nature are more likely to engage in behaviors intended to protect the environment (e.g., recycling, purchasing local produce, volunteering or working with environmental organizations). In addition, individuals with a strong sense of connectedness are more likely to express concern about environmental issues and to prioritize environmental protection over personal or economic gain.

The figure below has been developed as a way of measuring a person’s stated level of connectedness. On the 7-point scale (1 being the top left, 7 being the bottom right), we typically see scores for adults around 3.5. Children tend to score higher than adults (low 4s), as do self-identified environmentalists. For readers of this essay, I’d expect scores to be in the upper 4s (self-selection would screen out low scorers from getting this far into an essay about connecting with nature).

Zoos and aquariums can foster cultures of care and conservation by connecting people to nature. Our research has shown that spending time at a zoo increases a person’s connectedness with nature. This effect has been found across many studies in a number of demographic segments, including children and adults, zoo members and nonmembers, rural and urban residents, and visitors who are initially low in connectedness or high. In fact, from a large number of leisure and recreational activities, spending time at the zoo emerges as one of the only experiences that consistently promotes connectedness. [2]

Importantly, the structure of the zoo experience can play a critical role in promoting connectedness. On the positive side are zoo exhibits and activities that serve to provide a personal and direct experience with plants and animals. Those that involve multiple senses—touching, smelling, hearing, seeing, tasting—will likely be more powerful than those that are passive or involve only one sense. Personal experiences will be more powerful than those mediated by technology. Those that showcase animals in their natural environment and their natural behaviors will be stronger than those that are contrived, or those that belittle animals through dress, training, or domestication. And finally, activities that encourage visitors to transcend their personal perspectives and to adopt broader, more inclusive views of self and nature enhance connectedness. To this end, including thrill rides, roller coasters, or other egoistically appealing activities that put the focus on self rather than others will likely undermine the positive impact of the zoo experience on connectedness.

In closing, zoos and aquariums provide visitors with an opportunity to connect with nature in a safe environment. Zoos can inspire visitors by showcasing the diversity of life on the planet, and these experiences prompt us to care about things and beings beyond ourselves. But importantly, merely housing animals and bringing visitors through zoo exhibits will not sufficiently stir our sense of connectedness. To maximize their impact upon care and conservation, zoo experiences should be carefully structured to avoid distancing people from nature by creating barriers that prompt visitors to think of themselves as superior to or dominant over nature. Similarity and respect are pathways to connectedness, and the zoo experience can take visitors down this road.

[1] Schultz, Wesley. FlexiTwins . Retrieved from www.flexitwins.com

[2] The only other two experiences that we’ve found to increase connectedness are hiking and art activities involving nature. We’ve tested a large number of other experiences including golfing, going to the beach, time in a library, an indoor rock climbing gym, exercise in an indoor gym, and working in an office building. Only the zoo, hike, and art activities resulted in more connectedness.

Image Credit

“Balance” by Tom Woodward. (CC BY-SA 2.0)

• Published May 6, 2016

Wesley Schultz

Professor Wesley Schultz is an expert in the areas of behavior and attitude change, conservation psychology, and statistics. His work in these areas has examined the psychological process of social influence, particularly as they apply to environmental behaviors.

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Human Nature as a Power to Make Choices Essay

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Behavior Starts Before Birth

Bad things are easy to do, biological or theoretical perception, works cited.

Human beings were created in a very special way because they are the only species that can question their own character. Now that we understand how we came into being, it is also important to understand why we behave in a certain manner. The knowledge of both good and bad enables man to control his environment. Some people feel that the good and bad exist by default, and they are used for our own advantage. For instance, when attacked by another person one has to fight back in self-defense.

On the other hand, when other people do good things to us we respond by appreciating their good gesture through the good things that we do to them or offer them, such as presents and hugs. This paper seeks to assert that we are neither born bad nor good by the human nature, but rather we have power to make choices.

In this regard, man is induced to do bad or good things by the people around him. However, this argument is not true because there are many people who offend others without a good reason. For instance, why would someone who is hardly known to you break into your house and take away your personal belongings?

This suggests that people do good or bad things when it suits them because in the above scenario the bugler engages in crime as a way of earning his daily bread. This can only be acceptable when that person may have tried other means and failed to achieve the desired results. It is then expected that if the person who is bad to people finds an alternative way of earning his daily bread he would switch to being good.

When a child is born, it cannot tell the difference between the good and the wrong things and it only depends on the guidance provided by the parents and guardians. It then follows that if the parents do not correct the child early enough he/she will grow to be a bad person and the parents should then bear all the blame.

Besides that, the people that one associates with play a major role in building one’s character. This is because if the friends one interacts with are of bad character they may influence that person negatively. This is very common among adolescents because they hardly recognize themselves. Because they long for recognition, they do whatever their friends do, just to be accepted. It only dawns on them later in life that they have independent lives.

Human behavior commences before the baby is born. This is evidenced by the fact that unborn babies engage in numerous activities while still in the womb of their mothers such as sucking their own fingers. Ekman asserts that this argument can be proved true by observing a pregnant woman by using a scanner.

When the baby is finally born, it does not care whether what it does is good or bad because it only cares about itself. When this attitude is allowed to grow that child grows to be a bad person because he/she wants to things in his/her favor and does not consider the people affected by his/her actions. This attitude is expressed as selfishness because it causes people to focus on themselves and ignore other people.

Another argument that explains why some people are bad is that bad things are easily done than good things. Doing good things is perceived to be tiring and takes longer to accomplish the intended purpose.

For instance, if one needs to buy a car he/she needs to work harder including working extra hours and avoiding some luxuries to enable him/her to save enough money and it may take several years to achieve this goal. On the other hand, stealing somebody else’s car makes it easy to achieve this goal because it takes a few minutes to do so.

Most people are initially good, but then there are circumstances in their lives that cause their behavior to be transformed. This is because in as much as one wants to do good things to others, there are many people who respond to their noble behavior by doing bad things. This causes the people who are good to be discouraged because their conduct does not attract the expected behavior from others.

Consider a famous person like Osama Bin Laden, who was viewed by his educators as a very humble person, but his late transformation into a seasoned terrorist sent tremor across the globe until he was recently captured. This argument implies that if one does not beget what he/she gives then that person ceases to be good. For instance, if one is honest, but keeps on being lied to he/she will also be tempted to lie.

Buller argues that our environment plays a major role in transforming our character. This is because if a child is raised up in a warring country, the first thing he/she will learn is to defend him/herself by learning how to use the various weapons at his/her disposal. Some people are bad or good because they inherited some personality traits from their parents’ lineage.

For instance, a child may grow to be a bank robber or a priest while none of his parents were interested in these careers (being a robber is also a career) but a close evaluation of the parents family tree could reveal that one of the ancestors was a robber or a religious leader. This means that a couple of good personality can sire children who are social misfits.

Human behavior is also influenced by gender, which is, being male or female. Men tend to be more physically aggressive owing to their masculinity while women are gentler because they are not physically strong.

Additionally women’s gentleness is important when it comes to mothering because if children were to be nursed by men, human population would be at risk of being gradually eliminated from the surface of the earth.

Women are neater than men are, because they are sensitive to fowl smells unlike their male counterparts who can go for days without taking a bath. The society expects men to be vigilant because they are the ones responsible of defending the community.

A theory of human nature must have a reflection right from the beginning whether it sees human beings in essentially biological terms, as animals like other animals, or else in essentially supernatural terms, as creatures who are like God in some unique way, and therefore outstandingly unlike other animals. Most of the perennial philosophical arguments have proved so obstinate in one way or another because their supporters divide along these lines.

Those who perceive that human beings as just a particular complex materials found everywhere on Earth, suppose that we are ultimately formed out of the same material structure from which animals are made. If that could be the case that human beings were constituted of the same material form like animals, then according to the friends of dualism, such a scenario could hardly do any justice to what is considered special about the human nature.

Equally, according to the Libertarians, strongly non-deterministic conceptions of free will see something special out of human naturalness and moral responsibility. To their rivals, human beings do operate on the same standards, although more complex, as do squid and plankton.

Such perceptions and others should not bring a division along the religious cut lines. One many oppose naturalism without even reflecting on supernatural theistic outlook. For instant, one might view it that human beings are essentially unlike other biological creatures, but yet not to suppose that we have been made to be that way by a higher power.

Equally, the theist may perceive it as part of the divine plan in having human beings as nothing much than being the most complete and complex of the biological organisms, composed of the same form and guarded by the same laws.

Therefore, even though I have described between two perceptions, biological and naturalistic against theological and supernatural- detains an important fault that runs through the intense debate over the human nature, it by no other means determines all of one’s successive philosophical choices. According to the philosophy of Thomas Aquinas, it exemplifies on the sort of tensions that do arise out of this two perceptions.

For while, the entire orientation of Aquinas’s work is merely theistic, not at all does he harbor any sympathy for a naturalistic, biological appreciation of the human nature. In some of the cases, for instance, in his account of the human intellect, the supernaturalism perception clearly wins out.

In some instances, as in the conception of the human beings as a make-up of the soul- body union, it is likewise clear that biological considerations are paramount. In still other incidences, for instance, on his opinion on free will, it becomes very difficult to state the thoughts that hold way, and the preference of the interpreters of his works is largely presided over by their individual predictions.

The conventional ways of making this point clear, of whether we have a human nature, is by describing Aquinas as mediating between the theological teachings of the church and Aristotle philosophical writings. On historical perspective, this is an apt place to begin thinking about the Aquinas philosophy, because it is very certain that the challenges that Aquinas encountered in his career work was find a common place for Aristotle’s newly recorded works within the prevailing framework of Christian belief.

Finding a place for Aristotle meant going deep into finding a place for a conception of human nature, which is biological in its general course. Though one may try to reconcile Aristotle and Christianity, however, essential as it may seem to be to understanding Aquinas historical situation, does not fit the natural – supernatural peculiarity as precisely as one might expect. This is because even the Aristotle’s notion of soul is essentially biological.

On the other hand, there are propensities in the Christian thoughts towards treating the body in a spiritual fashion, as a temporary prison of the soul. Moreover, there is also the doctrine of resurrection, whereby the separation of the body is an impermanent state of affairs, which will be remedied by the body’s eventual reinstatement, for all the eternity, at the final judgment.

Aquinas therefore, understands the resurrection as pointing towards the essential biological character of the human nature, in the sense that human beings are not only souls, but also incarnate souls. Although it is very certain that Aquinas regards intellectual and volitional powers as the greatest attributes of humankind, which arises from the side of the soul rather than the body, he is yet obstinate that an entire understanding of the human nature requires one to understand the body nature as well.

Human beings are not created as pure spiritual beings as angels who are nothing more than the incorporeal minds, that is not who the human beings are. Human beings are essentially mind-body complexes. So for one to understand if really we have a human nature, the study of the mental capacities, intellectual and will is not be enough, but the entire human body.

According to Hobbes’s conception on human nature, he considers the principles of human action as being progressive, which accounts for human motivation. He also views human nature as a being able to organize the society. A fundamental feature of his claim on the human nature is that, Hobbes has an atomistic conception of the human society, and this is based on his study on physics. Hobbes rejects organisms, by asserting that human beings were prompted into motion by the mechanical effects triggered from the senses.

They were not only supposed to be used for reflex actions, but rather use them also in guiding their actions away from those, which might be harmful, and towards those that might be termed as beneficial. He also argues that a human person is also embodied into having power to compete with others, for instance in a case where there is auctioneering. He therefore considers competing power as a necessity feature of human nature (Hobbes 23).

Currently, there is no common agreement on the connection and knowledge of natural sciences in the advancement of human nature concerning philosophical or religious ideologies. Such conformity or perception cannot be feasible when there is no common concept explaining the human nature.

Conclusively and putting into consideration the diverse theories from theologians and philosophers as discussed, we can say that we have a human nature that is not only composed of the soul and mind but rather by the entire body. We are neither born bad nor good by the human nature, but rather we have power to make choices. The society or the environment we are living in may influence the choices we make.

Buller, David. Adapting Minds: Evolutionary Psychology and the Persistent Quest for Human Nature. Massachusetts: MIT Press, 2005. Print.

Ekman, Paul. “Darwin’s Compassionate View of Human Nature.” The Journal of the American Medical Association. 303.6 (2010): 557-558. doi: 10.1001/jama.2010.101.

Haidt, Jonathan. The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom. New York: Basic Books, 2006. Print.

Hobbes, Thomas. Leviathan. London: Penguin, 1985. Print.

Rutherford, James. “An Ecological Organic Paradigm: A Framework of Analysis for Moral and Political Philosophy.” Journal of Consciousness Studies. , 6.10 (1999): 81–103. Electronic.

Savage, Joanne, and Satoshi Kanazawa. “Social Capital, Crime, and Human Nature.” Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice. 18.2 (2002): 188-211. doi: 10.1177/1043986202018002005.

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Home — Essay Samples — Philosophy — Philosophical Concepts — Human Nature

Essays on Human Nature

Writing an essay on human nature is important because it allows us to explore and understand the fundamental aspects of being human. By delving into the complexities of human behavior, emotions, and thought processes, we can gain insight into our own nature and the nature of others. This understanding can lead to greater empathy, compassion, and self-awareness.

When writing an essay on human nature, it is important to consider the various perspectives and theories that have been put forth by philosophers, psychologists, and sociologists. These differing viewpoints can provide a rich tapestry of ideas and concepts to draw from, allowing for a nuanced and comprehensive exploration of the topic.

It is also crucial to support your arguments with evidence and examples. This can include real-life experiences, case studies, and scholarly research. By grounding your essay in concrete examples, you can make your points more persuasive and compelling.

Additionally, it is important to consider the ethical and moral implications of human nature. How do our fundamental traits and behaviors impact our relationships with others? How do they shape our society and culture? These questions can add depth and complexity to your essay, prompting readers to consider the broader implications of human nature.

In conclusion, writing an essay on human nature is a valuable endeavor that can lead to greater self-awareness and understanding of others. By considering different perspectives, providing evidence, and exploring ethical implications, you can create a thought-provoking and insightful essay on this fundamental aspect of the human experience.

What Makes a Good Human Nature Essay Topics

When it comes to writing an essay on human nature, choosing the right topic is crucial. Good Essay Topics should be thought-provoking, engaging, and relevant to the subject matter. To brainstorm and choose an essay topic, consider what aspects of human nature interest you the most. Think about current events, philosophical questions, or social issues that relate to human behavior. A good essay topic should also be specific and focused, allowing for in-depth analysis and exploration. Additionally, consider the potential for debate or differing viewpoints, as this can lead to a more compelling and impactful essay.

Best Human Nature Essay Topics

• The concept of free will and its impact on human behavior
• The role of empathy in shaping human relationships
• The influence of nature vs. nurture on personality development
• The psychology of persuasion and its effects on decision-making
• The ethics of genetic engineering and its implications for human nature
• The connection between technology and human connection
• The impact of social media on self-perception and identity
• The evolutionary roots of human emotions and instincts
• The concept of good and evil in human nature
• The role of culture in shaping human values and beliefs
• The psychology of addiction and its impact on human behavior
• The relationship between power and human behavior
• The impact of trauma on human resilience and coping mechanisms
• The intersection of biology and psychology in understanding human nature
• The influence of social norms on individual behavior
• The connection between creativity and human nature
• The impact of environmental factors on human development
• The role of spirituality in shaping human values and beliefs
• The psychology of decision-making and its impact on human behavior
• The concept of identity and its relationship to human nature

Human Nature Essay Topics Prompts

• Imagine a world without the concept of good and evil. How would human behavior be different?
• If you could genetically engineer a specific trait in humans, what would it be and why?
• Explore the connection between human behavior and the natural environment, focusing on a specific aspect of nature.
• Write a personal reflection on a time when you experienced a conflict between your instincts and societal expectations.
• Create a fictional scenario that explores the impact of a technological advancement on human nature, considering both positive and negative effects.

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October 22, 2013

Why We Are Wired to Connect

Scientist Matthew Lieberman uncovers the neuroscience of human connections—and the broad implications for how we live our lives

By Gareth Cook

When we experience social pain — a snub, a cruel word — the feeling is as real as physical pain. That finding is among those in a new book, Social , and it is part of scientist Matthew Lieberman’s case that our need to connect is as fundamental as our need for food and water. He answered questions from Mind Matters editor Gareth Cook .

You argue that our need to connect socially is “powerful.” But just how powerful is it?

Different cultures have different beliefs about how important social connection and interdependence are to our lives.  In the West, we like to think of ourselves as relatively immune to sway of those around us while we each pursue our personal destiny.  But I think this is a story we like to tell ourselves rather than what really happens. 

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Across many studies of mammals, from the smallest rodents all the way to us humans, the data suggests that we are profoundly shaped by our social environment and that we suffer greatly when our social bonds are threatened or severed.  When this happens in childhood it can lead to long-term health and educational problems.  We may not like the fact that we are wired such that our well-being depends on our connections with others, but the facts are the facts.

What is the connection between physical pain and social pain? Why is this insight important?

Languages around the world use pain language to express social pain (“she broke my heart”, “he hurt my feelings”), but this could have all just have been a metaphor.  As it turns out it is more than a metaphor – social pain is real pain.

With respect to understanding human nature, I think this finding is pretty significant.  The things that cause us to feel pain are things that are evolutionary recognized as threats to our survival and the existence of social pain is a sign that evolution has treated social connection like a necessity, not a luxury.  It also alters our motivational landscape.  We tend to assume that people’s behavior is narrowly self-interested, focused on getting more material benefits for themselves and avoiding physical threats and the exertion of effort.  But because of how social pain and pleasure are wired into our operating system, these are motivational ends in and of themselves.  We don’t focus on being connected solely in order to extract money and other resources from people – being connected needs no ulterior motive. 

This has major consequences for how we think about structuring our organizations and institutions.  At businesses worldwide, pay for performance is just about the only incentive used to motivate employees.  However, praise and an environment free from social threats are also powerful motivators.  Because social pain and pleasure haven’t been a part of our theory of “who we are” we tend not to use these social motivators as much as we could.

You devote a section of your book to what you call “mindreading.” What do you mean by this, and why do you see it as so essential?

First off, I’m not referring to the ESP kind of mindreading. I mean the everyday variety that each of us use in most social interactions.  We have a profound proclivity towards trying to understand the thoughts and feelings bouncing around inside the skulls of people we interact with, characters on television, and even animated shapes moving around a computer screen.  Although we are far from perfect at gleaning the actual mental states of others, the fact that we can do this at all gives us an unparalleled ability to cooperate and collaborate with others – using their goals to help drive our own behavior.

The funny thing is that thinking about others’ thoughts doesn’t feel particularly different from most kinds of analytical thinking we do.  Yet, fMRI research shows that there are two distinct networks that support social and non-social thinking and that as one network increases its activity the other tends to quiet down – kind of like a neural seesaw.  Here’s the really fascinating thing.  Whenever we finish doing some kind of non-social thinking, the network for social thinking comes back on like a reflex – almost instantly. 

Why would the brain be set up to do this?  We have recently found that this reflex prepares us to walk into the next moment of our lives focused on the minds behind the actions that we see from others.  Evolution has placed a bet that the best thing for our brain to do in any spare moment is to get ready to see the world socially.  I think that makes a major statement about the extent to which we are built to be social creatures.

One of the long-standing mysteries of psychology is the question of where the “self” comes from, and what the “self” even means. Does your research shed any light on this question?

Social psychologists have long speculated that the self is a much more social phenomenon then it intuitively feels like from the inside.  There have certainly been studies over the years that are consistent with this idea, however neuroscience is bringing new data to bear that speaks directly to this idea.

There's a region of the brain called “medial prefrontal cortex” that essentially sits between your eyes. This region has been shown again and again to be activated the more a person is reflecting on themselves. It is the region that most clearly and unambiguously is associated with “self-processing.”  If you think about your favorite flavor of ice-cream, precious personal memories, or consider aspects of your personality (e.g. Are you generous? Are you messy?) you are likely to recruit this brain region.

Given that we tend to think of the self as the thing that separates us from others – that allows us to know how we are different and how to walk our own path – it would be surprising if this same medial prefrontal region was involved in allowing the beliefs of others to influence our own.  But this is exactly what we have seen in several studies.  The more active the medial prefrontal region is when someone is trying to persuade you of something (e.g. to wear sunscreen everyday) the more likely you’ll be to change your tune and start using sunscreen regularly.  Rather than being a hermetically sealed vault that separates us from others, our research suggests that the self is more of a Trojan horse, letting in the beliefs of others, under the cover of darkness and without us realizing it.  This socially-influenced self helps to ensure that we’ll have the same kind of beliefs and values as those of the people around us and this is a great catalyst for social harmony.

What does this research tell us about how we should be raising our children, and what does it mean for education?  I think the most important thing is to educate our children about what we are learning about the true role of our social nature in our happiness and success in life.  Intellectually, I know all about these things, but if we don't learn them as children, I'm not sure they ever really get into our guts and guide our intuitive decision-making.  I think kids would love learning about how the social world works and how their brain makes that possible.

The research on the social brain also leads to direct policy implications for education.  The data are clear that children learn better when they learn in order to teach someone else than when they learn in order to take a test.  Learning to teach someone else is prosocial and relies on the social networks of the brain.  We had no idea these networks could promote memory but now we do.  We ought to be doing much more peer learning, particularly age-staggered learning.  My ideal situation would be a 14 year who has trouble in the classroom being assigned to teach a 12 year old.  The teacher then becomes a coach helping to teach the 12 year old and the 14 year old will reap the benefits of prosocial learning.

Are you a scientist who specializes in neuroscience, cognitive science, or psychology? And have you read a recent peer-reviewed paper that you would like to write about? Please send suggestions to Mind Matters editor Gareth Cook , a Pulitzer prize-winning journalist and regular contributor to NewYorker.com. Gareth is also the series editor of Best American Infographics , and can be reached at garethideas AT gmail.com or Twitter @garethideas .

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Human Nature (Essay Sample)

Human nature.

Human nature comprises of unique features human exhibit like emotion, thoughts, and actions. These three features are distinct from cultural influences.  The argument concerning some of the human characteristics that help describe human nature, how natural they are and their origin are the frequently debated questions when discussing human beings. Philosophers like Socrates, Aristotle, and Plato, presented varied views of human nature based on their experiences and observations. All these views continue to influence the philosophical beliefs of human beings.

Plato believed that the ability to choose between what is good and bad is part of human nature. Human has intrinsic values that guide them.  A philosopher like Augustine viewed human nature as the ability to incorporate unique metaphysics to develop rationalization. Augustine shared similar views of Plato and Plotinus that the body and the soul are different. Pluto believed that human actions are triggered by our thoughts that are generated from our soul.  Therefore, human existence is about exercising the free will to determine how to act. Defining human nature is describing the divine process that is beyond human understanding.

Augustine believed that any attempt to achieve good virtues by training, or learning is not achievable because it is through the divine intervention that we can describe the nature of human beings. According to Augustine, humans cannot do anything but simply have hope and faith in God to guide them through life process. I concur with Augustine that it is only through God’s work that humans can live a fulfilling life. Such sentiments contradict Plato’s view that human can exercise free will.

Augustine argument that God has infinite power is widely accepted because those who believe in God act in specific ways that present various outcomes that go beyond human understanding. Such sentiments have been expressed before by medieval philosophers who contend that humans are not capable of exercising free will because of God`s influence in their lives that affects their thoughts and actions.

The traditional theory of human nature presents humans as intellectual beings having a greater capacity for reasoning. Plato believed that human nature consists of three parts reasons, spirit and appetite and all the three were expected to function in harmony. The reasoning part of human nature is located in the brain; this controls the other parts of the body.  The spirit coordinates human feeling like temper and is located in the chest of the human body. The appetite is in charge with producing instincts like thirst hunger or lust and is located in the stomach.

Among all the three characteristics described by Plato is reason, reason is the most important part of human nature that it controls all the aspects of hum action hence guiding persons in his action. Humans are more independent of nature compared to an animal; humans are aware of their ability to reason and some of their consequences of their decisions. When analyzing the different views of human nature, I can conclude that humans are unique because of their capacity to think in a complex manner and be in control of their actions. It is evident that not all philosophers agree on the definition of human nature, but they all define similar patterns of reasoning from a natural system of ethics. According to Greek philosophers, human beings have instincts and emotion, but the most important character is their ability to reason and control their feelings and primitive urges.

The Impact and Origins of World War i

This essay about World War I, also known as the Great War, discusses its origins and impacts. It highlights the rapid industrialization and imperial ambitions of major European powers, the rise of nationalism, and the complex alliance systems that set the stage for conflict. The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand triggered a chain reaction, leading to a devastating global war. The war’s profound social, economic, and geopolitical consequences reshaped the world, ultimately setting the stage for future conflicts.

How it works

This intensive fight for global influence worsened competitions and suspicions existing, creates fat land for a conflict.

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Guiding humanity beyond the moon: OHIO researchers push to revolutionize human space biology

What actually happens to the human body in space? While scientists and researchers have heavily researched how various factors impact the human body here on Earth, the amount of information available about changes that occur in the body in space is not as well-known. Scientists, including OHIO’s Nate Szewczyk and several of his trainees, have been studying for years how the body, specifically on the molecular side, changes in space. Recently, a new package of papers has been published in “Nature” journals depicting how the modern tools of molecular biology and precision medicine can help guide humanity into more challenging missions beyond where we’ve already been.

The package of papers, titled “Space Omics and Medical Atlas across orbits,” includes manuscripts, data, protocols, and code, representing the largest-ever compendium of data for aerospace medicine and space biology. Over 100 institutions from more than 25 countries worked together to coordinate the release of this molecular, cellular, physiological, phenotypic, and spaceflight data.

Szewczyk, a professor in the Department of Biomedical Sciences and a principle investigator in the Ohio Musculoskeletal and Neurologic Institute, coauthored seven different articles including: “ Spaceflight induces changes in gene expression profiles linked to insulin and estrogen ,” “ Astronaut omics and the impact of space on the human body at scale ,” “ Understanding how space travel affects the female reproductive system ,” “ Transcriptomics analysis reveals molecular alterations underpinning spaceflight dermatology ,” “ Aging and putative frailty biomarkers are altered by spaceflight ,” and “ Ethical considerations for the age of non-governmental space exploration .”

In addition to coauthoring several papers, Szewczyk also involved his trainees on six of the papers. The trainees include OHIO medical students Anthony Carano and Caroline Coffey; Alexia Tasoula, a Ph.D. student in the translational biomedical sciences program; post-doctoral research Craig Willis, an OHIO alum and current assistant professor at the University of Bradford in the United Kingdom; as well as Dr. Henry Cope, researcher with the National Health Service in the United Kingdom.

Their articles highlight research from how spaceflight induced changes in insulin and estrogen signaling in rodents and humans, to ethical considerations for commercial spaceflight, and known and potential impacts of spaceflight on reproduction.

“We’ve studied worms for years but now have the ability to study people,” Szewczyk said. “We are at a place, particularly with NASA and the commercial sector, where we can focus on using more modern omics techniques to try and better understand changes in astronauts themselves, which can revolutionize their health.”

Szewczyk, known for his work researching worms in space, highlights the significance of these creatures as the first multicellular animals to have their genome sequenced. Leveraging genomics tools and techniques developed through worm studies, researchers have been able to delve into the molecular changes experienced by organisms in space. He notes that for over two decades, worms have been sent into space to observe gene expression alterations, paving the way for these similar studies in humans.

But as space flight becomes more commercialized and more people outside of just NASA’s astronauts pursue orbit, the need to understand the molecular level of humans in space becomes more important in ensuring their health and safety.

According to Szewczyk, the U.S. is growing in its space-based economy and as a result of that, there is now increased interest in commercial space flight. In Ohio, there is a new space park in Columbus set up by the commercial company Voyager Space.

“The more commercial space flight grows, the more important understanding people’s omics is,” Szewczyk explained. “Space medicine is evolving from something that really only NASA was responsible for since they were the only organization sending people into space, to something more common as commercial space flight grows. We are seeing an increase in this type of flight from SpaceX and other companies and it is crucial that those entering space are prepared. Flight providers must provide medical coverage for their participants. When people go to the International Space Station (ISS), it is governed by certain rules and regulations, whereas with commercial space flight, these same guidelines don’t necessarily apply. There is interest to grow space medicine and advance techniques for looking at health in space, especially as more people are able to go into orbit.”

Szewczyk's impact extends far beyond the laboratory as he actively advocates for open science and international collaboration, particularly in the field of space research. As co-chair of the NASA GeneLab Animal Analysis Working Group, he promotes the sharing of scientific knowledge among international space agencies, exemplified by initiatives like integrating the European Space Agency and the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) into NASA working groups. Moreover, his involvement in a JAXA Flagship Project includes leading efforts to harmonize ethical concerns and research methodologies for precision health in astronauts across multiple space agencies, including NASA, ESA, and JAXA.

“Humans are humans regardless of where they are from or currently live and the way space impacts them is ultimately the same,” Szewczyk said. “So the more we can all work together to compare how astronauts and those visiting space react in space, the better we can work to ensure safety and determine what guidelines need put in place for their health while in space and returning.”

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Do We Need Language to Think?

A group of neuroscientists argue that our words are primarily for communicating, not for reasoning.

By Carl Zimmer

For thousands of years, philosophers have argued about the purpose of language. Plato believed it was essential for thinking. Thought “is a silent inner conversation of the soul with itself,” he wrote.

Many modern scholars have advanced similar views. Starting in the 1960s, Noam Chomsky, a linguist at M.I.T., argued that we use language for reasoning and other forms of thought. “If there is a severe deficit of language, there will be severe deficit of thought,” he wrote .

As an undergraduate, Evelina Fedorenko took Dr. Chomsky’s class and heard him describe his theory. “I really liked the idea,” she recalled. But she was puzzled by the lack of evidence. “A lot of things he was saying were just stated as if they were facts — the truth,” she said.

Dr. Fedorenko went on to become a cognitive neuroscientist at M.I.T., using brain scanning to investigate how the brain produces language. And after 15 years, her research has led her to a startling conclusion: We don’t need language to think.

“When you start evaluating it, you just don’t find support for this role of language in thinking,” she said.

When Dr. Fedorenko began this work in 2009, studies had found that the same brain regions required for language were also active when people reasoned or carried out arithmetic.

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