At a time of increasing disconnectedness from nature, scientific interest in the potential health benefits of nature contact has grown. Research in recent decades has yielded substantial evidence, ...but large gaps remain in our understanding.
We propose a research agenda on nature contact and health, identifying principal domains of research and key questions that, if answered, would provide the basis for evidence-based public health interventions.
We identify research questions in seven domains:
) mechanistic biomedical studies;
) exposure science;
) epidemiology of health benefits;
) diversity and equity considerations;
) technological nature;
) economic and policy studies; and
) implementation science.
Nature contact may offer a range of human health benefits. Although much evidence is already available, much remains unknown. A robust research effort, guided by a focus on key unanswered questions, has the potential to yield high-impact, consequential public health insights. https://doi.org/10.1289/EHP1663.
Celotno besedilo
Dostopno za:
CEKLJ, DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, OILJ, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK, VSZLJ
Display omitted
•We present a detailed framework of human wellbeing for ecosystem-based management.•Connections, capabilities, and conditions may be assessed using indicators.•Cross-cutting analyses ...can assess equity, security, resilience, and sustainability.•The framework and focal attributes should be modified to serve diverse contexts.•2300 existing social indicators are compiled from which to select measures.
There is growing interest in assessing the effects of changing environmental conditions and management actions on human wellbeing. A challenge is to translate social science expertise regarding these relationships into terms usable by environmental scientists, policymakers, and managers. Here, we present a comprehensive, structured, and transparent conceptual framework of human wellbeing designed to guide the development of indicators and a complementary social science research agenda for ecosystem-based management. Our framework grew out of an effort to develop social indicators for an integrated ecosystem assessment (IEA) of the California Current large marine ecosystem. Drawing from scholarship in international development, anthropology, geography, and political science, we define human wellbeing as a state of being with others and the environment, which arises when human needs are met, when individuals and communities can act meaningfully to pursue their goals, and when individuals and communities enjoy a satisfactory quality of life. We propose four major social science-based constituents of wellbeing: connections, capabilities, conditions, and cross-cutting domains. The latter includes the domains of equity and justice, security, resilience, and sustainability, which may be assessed through cross-cutting analyses of other constituents. We outline a process for identifying policy-relevant attributes of wellbeing that can guide ecosystem assessments. To operationalize the framework, we provide a detailed table of attributes and a large database of available indicators, which may be used to develop measures suited to a variety of management needs and social goals. Finally, we discuss four guidelines for operationalizing human wellbeing measures in ecosystem assessments, including considerations for context, feasibility, indicators and research, and social difference. Developed for the U.S. west coast, the framework may be adapted for other regions, management needs, and scales with appropriate modifications.
Salmon are intrinsic to health and well-being in Alaska, and sit at the center of myriad social, cultural, and spiritual practices, norms, and values. These practices and values are essential to ...living and being well in many communities in Alaska, but often remain invisible and unaccounted for in management contexts. This paper stems from the collective efforts of a cross-disciplinary, cross-cultural project team brought together as part of the State of Alaska's Salmon and People (SASAP) knowledge synthesis project. In this paper, we assess the sustainability and equity of Alaska salmon systems through a well-being framework. Key objectives include (1) defining and conceptualizing well-being in the context of Alaska salmon systems; (2) developing and assessing well-being indicators for Alaska salmon systems; and (3) evaluating how well-being concepts are currently incorporated into Alaska salmon management and suggesting improvements. We draw on specific examples to evaluate the application of well-being indicators as a tool to more effectively measure and evaluate social considerations, and discuss how to better integrate well-being concepts into governance and management to improve data collection and decision making. As part of this effort, we discuss trends and inequities in Alaska fisheries and communities that impact well-being, and tensions between equality and equity in the context of Alaska salmon management.
Introduction: Interrelated social and ecological challenges demand an understanding of how environmental change and management decisions affect human well-being. This paper outlines a framework for ...measuring human well-being for ecosystem-based management (EBM). We present a prototype that can be adapted and developed for various scales and contexts. Scientists and managers use indicators to assess status and trends in integrated ecosystem assessments (IEAs). To improve the social science rigor and success of EBM, we developed a systematic and transparent approach for evaluating indicators of human well-being for an IEA.
Methods: Our process is based on a comprehensive conceptualization of human well-being, a scalable analysis of management priorities, and a set of indicator screening criteria tailored to the needs of EBM. We tested our approach by evaluating more than 2000 existing social indicators related to ocean and coastal management of the US West Coast. We focused on two foundational attributes of human well-being: resource access and self-determination.
Outcomes and Discussion: Our results suggest that existing indicators and data are limited in their ability to reflect linkages between environmental change and human well-being, and extremely limited in their ability to assess social equity and justice. We reveal a critical need for new social indicators tailored to answer environmental questions and new data that are disaggregated by social variables to measure equity. In both, we stress the importance of collaborating with the people whose well-being is to be assessed.
Conclusion: Our framework is designed to encourage governments and communities to carefully assess the complex tradeoffs inherent in environmental decision-making.
Prevailing models of the human–environment relationship in environmental science, policy, and management (ESPM), largely based on the Drivers-Pressures-State-Impact-Responses (DPSIR) framework, are ...restricted in their ability to incorporate insights from the environmental social sciences and humanities (ESSH). A review of related literature suggests that ESSH scholars are more likely to critique these models for reinforcing problematic social trends than employ them as analytical tools. Nevertheless, the language of ESPM frameworks can be repurposed to account for a broader range of social considerations. As a first step, this paper develops the concept of “drivers” to focus on social drivers – i.e., the major social, political, economic, and cultural forces that shape social–ecological systems. For example, neoliberalism may be viewed as a major social driver that has significantly affected small-scale fisheries. While the ecological and economic goals for neoliberal strategies (such as catch shares) are optimistic, commonly observed social effects of these policies are less favorable. This paper illustrates how, if needed, indicators can be developed to assess the social effects of neoliberal policies so that they may be analyzed alongside their economic and ecological effects in an integrated assessment. Such an approach may help draw ESPM attention to the critical roles of social drivers and social conditions in interrelated social and environmental problems. Focusing on social drivers offers a potential avenue for bridging ESPM and ESSH, and collaborating toward mutual goals of environmental sustainability and human wellbeing.
•Dominant ecosystem models are limited in their ability to include social insights.•Renewing focus on social drivers may help managers understand social systems.•Neoliberalism is a social driver that has clearly affected small-scale fisheries.•The social effects of neoliberal fisheries policies can be tracked via indicators.•Focusing on social drivers could help bridge disciplines in ecosystem management.
Salmon recovery has been described as a "wicked" problem in that it is so complex it is seemingly impossible to solve. Through a detailed case study, this article models how the field of political ...ecology can provide rich insight into such problems, and can help managers navigate the complex human dimensions of their work. Protracted disputes over salmon habitat restoration have earned the Skagit Valley of Washington State a reputation for being mired in intractable conflict. Goals of recovering salmon and protecting farmland are seemingly pitted against each other in competition for the same land. Using ethnographic methods and a political ecology framework, I argue that social hierarchies and mistrusts, conflicting senses of place, prevailing cultural narratives, and legal and institutional constraints contribute to the dispute over habitat restoration. Closer attention to sociocultural factors such as these may help managers identify and implement locally supported recovery opportunities, facilitate cooperation among stakeholders, improve agency approaches, and reframe management agendas to better address collective needs. I conclude that ecosystem recovery requires not only the renewal of ecological health, but also the renewal of social trust and cooperation, new cultural narratives, and a richer language that can capture its complex social realities.
In the northwest corner of the US, commercial farmers defend their placebased heritage against the scientific and regulatory strategies of local Native American tribes seeking to restore salmon ...habitat in agricultural areas. The apparent irony of this scenario stems from a set of unique circumstances in the American Northwest that complicates dominant narratives and allegiances in political ecology and related fields. Ethnographic and historical evidence shows how a century of tribal activism to regain treaty fishing rights, and now to restore fish habitat, has collided with new forms of activism among county-supported farmers, whose counter-discourses depict themselves as stewards of the land. This case represents an exception to the more commonly observed pattern in which Western science and state power threaten to erode indigenous culture. It nevertheless suggests that the instrumentalist approach to salmon habitat restoration in Washington state, on the part of tribal and non-tribal entities alike, constrains ecosystem recovery by preventing a sophisticated understanding of its complex social and cultural dimensions. A detailed understanding of the histories and place-based identities that motivate the political engagement of both tribal and agricultural communities could inform more socially effective strategies for achieving actual habitat restoration goals.
•Best available social science can improve management decisions and may be required.•Best available science standards fall short for evaluating qualitative social science.•We propose evaluative ...criteria for the full range of best available social science.•The criteria have commonalities and differences with those used for natural science.
Increasing recognition of the human dimensions of natural resource management issues, and of social and ecological sustainability and resilience as being inter-related, highlights the importance of applying social science to natural resource management decision-making. Moreover, a number of laws and regulations require natural resource management agencies to consider the “best available science” (BAS) when making decisions, including social science. Yet rarely do these laws and regulations define or identify standards for BAS, and those who have tried to fill the gap have done so from the standpoint of best available natural science. This paper proposes evaluative criteria for best available social science (BASS), explaining why a broader set of criteria than those used for natural science is needed. Although the natural and social sciences share many of the same evaluative criteria for BAS, they also exhibit some differences, especially where qualitative social science is concerned. Thus we argue that the evaluative criteria for BAS should expand to include those associated with diverse social science disciplines, particularly the qualitative social sciences. We provide one example from the USA of how a federal agency − the U.S. Forest Service − has attempted to incorporate BASS in responding to its BAS mandate associated with the national forest planning process, drawing on different types of scientific information and in light of these criteria. Greater attention to including BASS in natural resource management decision-making can contribute to better, more equitable, and more defensible management decisions and policies.
In the northwest corner of the US, commercial farmers defend their place-based heritage against the scientific and regulatory strategies of local Native American tribes seeking to restore salmon ...habitat in agricultural areas. The apparent irony of this scenario stems from a set of unique circumstances in the American Northwest that complicates dominant narratives and allegiances in political ecology and related fields. Ethnographic and historical evidence shows how a century of tribal activism to regain treaty fishing rights, and now to restore fish habitat, has collided with new forms of activism among county-supported farmers, whose counter-discourses depict themselves as stewards of the land. This case represents an exception to the more commonly observed pattern in which Western science and state power threaten to erode indigenous culture. It nevertheless suggests that the instrumentalist approach to salmon habitat restoration in Washington state, on the part of tribal and non-tribal entities alike, constrains ecosystem recovery by preventing a sophisticated understanding of its complex social and cultural dimensions. A detailed understanding of the histories and place-based identities that motivate the political engagement of both tribal and agricultural communities could inform more socially effective strategies for achieving actual habitat restoration goals. Keywords: Environmental conflict, science studies, place-making, agriculture, Native Americans
PDF
