Urban versus rural? The effects of residential status on species identification skills and connection to nature

1. Urbanization and urban lifestyles increasingly disconnect people from nature in a process that was termed the ‘extinction of experience’. This loss of human-nature interactions can undermine both cognitive (ecological knowledge) and affective (emotional connection to nature) relations to nature, further impacting capabilities to experience, care for, benefit from and act to protect nature. Yet, the extent to which the urban life influences both cognitive and affective relations to nature, remains poorly understood and research is confined to a few countries and cultures.

2. We explored how cognitive and affective relations to nature can be related to people’s childhood and current place of residency. We expected that urban dwellers, who have less opportunities to experience nature than their rural counterparts, will be less connected to nature and demonstrate lower ecological knowledge than their rural counterparts.

3. We conducted four surveys in Israel, in urban and rural set...