Does Childhood Use of Parks Influence Relationships with Nature in Adulthood?

Does Childhood Use of Parks Influence Relationships with Nature in Adulthood?

Photography: Treverno Playing Field, Camborne and Inset Wildflowers in Saltash, Cornwall Spring 2018: Rosie Walker 2018

Rosie Walker / 670049493 MSc Conservation Science and Policy Target Journal: People and Nature A new journal to be published by the prestigious British Ecological Society, ‘People and Nature’, will focus primarily on papers which draw on a transdisciplinary feel and although containing some ecological focus, will include dimensions from sociology, psychology and geography (BES, 2018). I have chosen this journal as the research focus in this paper is an excellent fit with this theme as it ties together environmental psychology through its focus on human cognitive Nature Connectedness, elements of ecology through its examination of biodiversity improvements, and its title links together human use of the environment with relationships with nature, which sits well with the title of the journal.

Abstract In recent years, set against a context of diminishing global biodiversity, Nature Connectedness has increasingly been measured and studied to understand how people cognitively relate to the natural world around them and to understand how Nature Connectedness influences pro-environmental attitudes.

People with higher connectedness to nature have been found to benefit the most from the green space around them with better health and well-being outcomes. To understand how nature connectedness develops, we investigated how childhood use of parks might influence relationships with nature in adulthood. We explored how frequency of visits to parks in childhood and the activities that are done in parks in childhood influences nature connectedness, and how nature connection in adults influences their attitudes towards biodiversity improvements planned for their local greenspace.

During Autumn 2017 and Spring 2018 across 7 towns in Cornwall, maildrop questionnaires were sent to houses close to small local greenspaces and a small number of interviews were conducted in parks with park users. Our findings were inconclusive as to whether the number of childhood visits to parks and the activities they do in them influences Nature Connectedness in adults, but we found a strong relationship in adults with increasing nature connectedness and their likelihood of support for biodiversity improvements planned for their local parks. Overall, Nature Connectedness was high. Biodiversity in local parks is important for older populations’ interactions with nature and increasing biodiversity in urban areas can only serve to improve outcomes for people and nature.

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Introduction “We are faced with the potential extinction of thousands of species and radical changes to many of the world’s ecosystems in the next 50-100 years. Paradoxically, conservation may increasingly depend on the ability of people in cities to maintain a connection with nature.”

(Dunn et al., 2006)

The world’s population is rapidly increasing; numbering nearly 7.6 billion in 2017 and the numbers of people living in urban areas is now greater than those in rural areas; increasing urban sprawl and placing increased demand on services and stresses on residents (United Nations, 2017a, 2017b). The exponential growth of the human population has put untold pressure on the natural environment, and is fast depleting humanity’s natural capital (Ceballos & Ehrlich, 2002). In the UK, whilst only 17% of the population of 54.3 million live in rural areas, urban growth is increasing at a faster rate than rural populations (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, 2018). This flight to the cities is likely to be resulting in human populations having less contact and connection with the natural world around them (Dunn et al., 2006).

The UK pioneered parks during the industrial revolution as an attempt to improve the growing urban environment and public health as towns industrialised and in urban areas parks are becoming a last bastion for exposure to greenspace and the natural environment (Reeves, 2000). However, local authorities in the UK are not legally required to fund greenspaces resulting in inconsistent quality and levels of maintenance (Cohen et al., 2006; Reeves, 2000).

Against the backdrop of diminishing biodiversity, environmental social science has significantly increased its focus in recent years on human-nature connection to describe, explain and analyse the dynamics of proenvironmental behaviour (Ives et al., 2017), with the objective to unearth the potential of Nature Connectedness to mitigate these environmental concerns. Despite the anthropogenic causes of deleterious impacts on the natural world, paradoxically, human empathy with nature has been found to have health and well-being benefits (Howell et al., 2011), promote deep cognitive processes (Bratman et al., 2015), 2

correlate with increased creativity (Atchley et al., 2012), and enhance human social behaviour (Zelenski etal., 2015). Nature Connectedness has been found to transcend socio-economic factors and age (Zhang et al., 2014). Therefore, the very biodiversity for which humans are causing an inordinate crisis, is the very same biodiversity which is crucial for our wellbeing and becoming more so as we lead more stressful lives.

Because nature connection has been found to be so important to outcomes in adulthood, understanding how it is developed in childhood is of great importance (Hunt et al., 2017). Connection to nature has been shown to be more malleable in childhood (Otto & Pensini, 2017) and this is a likely part of the human life course crucial to its formation (Wells & Lekies, 2006). The importance of education in stimulating the development of nature connection in children has been well documented (Sellmann & Bogner, 2013), but it is likely that there are many stimuli and pathways to nature connection (Restall & Conrad, 2015). The extent to which recreational activities in parks in childhood influence nature connection are less understood (Loukaitou-Sideris & Sideris, 2010).

Frequency of visit to greenspaces in childhood has been found to strongly align with positive attitudes towards these spaces in adulthood (Ward Thompson et al., 2008), however, in this study no assessment was made of the participants Connection to Nature, assessments of frequency of visit were broad and the sample size was small. Additionally only a small number of sites were considered. If frequency of exposure is crucial to the development of Nature Connection (Zelenski et al., 2015) then additionally, it is important to understand which childhood events are part of its formulation (Wells & Lekies, 2006). Wells & Lekies, (2006), study into the activities that promote nature connection was conducted in the USA and focussed on interactions with wild and domesticated nature, finding that interactions with wild nature are a significant pathway towards nature connection. Rupprecht et al. (2015), investigated the activities which adults do in parks, including educating children about nature, but did not measure the association of these with connection to nature, or consider in any detail, the activities which children do in parks which could connect them with nature. This study attempts to bring this together to inform understanding of the potential of parks for promoting nature connection in children.

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Because nature connection is strongly linked to pro-environmental attitudes (Hinds & Sparks, 2008) and previous research has considered the level of knowledge of the public about biodiversity (Southon et al., 2018; Muratet et al., 2015; Luck et al., 2011), the next step is to understand how connection to nature influences adults’ perceptions of improving biodiversity in their local parks. Improving this biodiversity will serve to increase interactions with nature and nature connection (Sandifer et al., 2015).

Research is making great progress in understanding the health and well-being benefits of parks, but it is implied that most of this research is taking place in larger, more formal parks (Muratet et al., 2015) and assessing those parks in which people will invest effort in getting to (Kaczynski et al.,2008).

The purpose of this study is to assess the influence that small local urban greenspaces have on peoples’ relationships with the natural world, by assessing how interactions with parks in childhood influence Nature Connectedness, and how this connection to nature influences perspectives on improving the biodiversity value of local greenspace. If a by-product function of parks is to promote connection to nature in children, and adults with higher nature connection are more supportive of biodiversity improvements in their local greenspace, this will offer a sustainable argument for increasing opportunities for positive interactions with nature in local parks.

Specifically, to further understanding of the development and implications of Nature Connectedness, we asked does the frequency of visiting parks as a child influence how connected to nature these people are as adults and does taking part in nature-based activities in parks as a child influence their connection to nature as adults. Thirdly, to understand the relationship of this Nature Connection to attitudes, we asked if there is a relationship between connection to nature in adults and increased support for biodiversity improvements in their local parks.

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Material and Methods Park Characteristics

We carried out this study in Cornwall in the Southwest of the UK, with people who live near 20 greenspaces of between 0.4 and 2.8 Hectares in size within urban areas. Towns included Bude, Camborne, Hayle, Penzance, Pool, Redruth and Saltash. Most greenspace sites were small and had few facilities, but exceptions to this were Longstone Park and Saltmill Park in Saltash (1.6 Hectares, and 5.4 Hectares respectively), which had bowling greens, tennis courts, play areas and a multi-use games area. Warfelton Sports Field, also in Saltash, was composed largely of a grass football pitch. As a minimum, all the public open spaces had at least one bench to sit on, except Treverno Public Open Space in Camborne, and all contained areas of mown grass. Saltmill Park was the only park which had a brown tourist sign for a tourist attraction or facility directly off a road managed by Highways England.

Social Survey

The survey questions used were part of a wider survey to assess the impact of European Funding of the Green Infrastructure for Growth (GI4G) project, a ÂŁ3.5 million programme of investment in Cornish towns to improve recreational areas, roadside verges and old churchyards for people and for wildlife (Cornwall Council, 2018).

The social survey was carried out through random maildrop to houses within a 1km radius of parks and greenspaces in 7 towns in Cornwall. Where sites were within the same 1km circle, (Camborne and Penzance), the area was divided to ensure that houses were only surveyed once. Questionnaires were posted through random letterboxes to between 60 and 75 households per greenspace with a stamped addressed envelope to ease return by respondents.

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A small number of interviews (N=35) were carried out in parks with park users. The same questions were asked and included in the results. The mean age of the respondents was similar; questionnaire respondents, 56, and for the interviews, 59. The gender makeup was also similar for females; 60% of respondents were female for the questionnaire and 62.87% of the interviews. However, there were fewer males in the maildrop questionnaires; 31.29%, 37.14% in the interviews. The difference made up by people who did not answer the question or had another gender preference.

64.7% of the surveys and all the interviews were carried out in the Autumn of 2017 with the remainder during the spring of 2018 (N = 137). This may have had the added strength of reducing the seasonality of park use (Cohen et al., 2011). However, because no surveys were carried out in peak and low seasons to compare, this cannot be confirmed. All surveys were carried out prior to any works commencing in the parks for the GI4G programme and so answers were not influenced by this happening.

The extracted survey questions pertaining to this paper can be found in Appendix 1. The complete questionnaire comprised of 14 questions regarding frequency of use of parks (57.5% of respondents were frequent users) and asked how respondents felt about their local park and greenspaces in general. This was done using five-point Likert Scales from strongly disagree to strongly agree. We also asked respondents about their socio-demographics. An additional 4 questions were added during the spring 2018 round of surveying regarding childhood use of parks. This subset was used to answer research questions 1 and 2 of the 3 discussed in this paper. The Spring 2018 subset had a response rate of 26.9%; the inclusion of the additional questions did not reduce the overall number of returns (24.88% overall response rate).

Nature Connection Measure Nature connection was measured using the construct developed by (Hunt et al., 2017), based on six statements relating to peoples’ perceptions of nature with a seven point Likert scale (Appendix 1, Q11).

Likert Scores were converted into a points based Nature Connection Index (NCI) following Hunt et al., (2017) which weights the responses to the different statements. A higher index score indicates a stronger 6

connection with nature and a maximum index rating of 100 is achieved if all 6 responses are given the highest Likert Score of 7. Only respondents who had answered all 6 elements of the construct were included. The data was converted to the NCI using R Studio (R Core Team, 2018).

Childhood Experience Asking people to remember their childhood experience of park use was considered a good study design as research on childhood memories of distinctive events tend to be happy and are often more reliable (Peterson et al., 2016); it was assumed that experiences in parks were generally likely to be happy. For the questions relating to childhood experience, the age group 9-11 was selected as this age group is still forming ideas about the natural world (Ernst & Theimer, 2011), and it provides a focus for respondents. Age 12 is also when children in the UK tend to change school, so the selected age group avoids this major life event.

Improving Wells & Lekies, (2006) research, which had a broader age range of pre-age 11, time was broken down into three distinct segments of ‘Weekends’, ‘After School’ and during ‘School holidays’ as these were identified to be appropriate parcels of free recreational time available in childhood. To measure frequency of park use in childhood, the 3 segments of time were broken down into a five-point Likert Scale from ‘All of the Time’ to ‘Never’. This was a modification to Ward Thompson et al., (2008) question who used a scale with categories of ‘Daily’, ‘Weekly’, ‘Monthly’, ‘Yearly’ and ‘Never’. Socio-economic covariates including age, gender, ethnicity, education and income level have been found not to impact on NCI (Lumber et al., 2017; Hinds & Sparks, 2008), and so these were not included in the analysis. The question used to measure frequency of childhood visit was used as the predictor (see appendix 1).

To understand whether the activities undertaken in parks as a child influenced NCI in adulthood, a question was posed which included 13 activities which were likely to be undertaken in parks (see Appendix 1). The list was developed through a pilot of asking the question to 20 individuals of various ages and both genders.

The final list used in the survey included 5 nature-based activities of ‘Doing Nature Activities, e.g. collecting 7

conkers, or blackberries’, ‘Feeding the ducks or other animals’, ‘Making Dens / houses’, ‘Climbing Trees’ and ‘Doing Supervised Nature Activities e.g. pond dipping, bulb or tree planting’ and 8 non-nature based activities, including ‘Played Games’, ‘Using the Playground’ and ‘Walking the Dog’. The answers were aggregated into a score for the number of ‘Nature Based Activities’ selected and an overall score for the ‘Total Number of Activities Selected’. These 2 groupings of activities were used as the predictors of the calculated NCI.

Pro-environmental Attitudes To assess pro-environmental attitudes, a short Likert Scale of ‘More’, ‘Same’, ‘Less’, ‘Don’t Know’ was used to evaluate whether respondents envisaged that they would change their level of use of their local park if a series of alterations were made which supported biodiversity or enhanced park features. The changes pertaining to biodiversity selected for the model were: ‘More Wildflowers’, ‘More Scattered Trees’, ‘More Hedges’, ‘Different Kinds of Vegetation’ and ‘More Fruit Trees’. The calculated NCI was used as the predictor to assess the likelihood of people supporting the biodiversity improvements.

Statistical Tests To understand the relationship between ‘Frequency of Childhood Park Use’ and ‘Nature Connection’ (NCI), a non-parametric Kruskal-Wallis H Test was run, due to the uneven sample sizes for each of the five categories, (Figure 1), within the categorical independent variables and the NCI data was not normally distributed for each of these groups, as assessed by a violation of the Shapiro-Wilk’s Test (p < 0.05). In addition, the available sample size was small for 3 of the 5 categories of the ordinal independent variable (Figure 1), and a visual inspection of a box plot revealed a small number of extreme outliers. Thus, the data failed the assumptions necessary to undertake an ANOVA analysis. The 3 segments of available recreation time had a high level of internal consistency (Cronbach’s alpha 0.948).

To check for bias in the sample, for the question regarding activities and NCI, a comparison of the average (Mean) NCI score and standard deviation was made between those who had answered the activities

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question and those who had not. A Spearman’s Rho correlation was run to assess whether an association existed between ‘Nature Based Activities’ and NCI and ‘Total Number of Activities Selected’ and NCI to understand if there was a relationship between the activities that respondents did as a child and NCI. To understand whether NCI was associated with pro-environmental attitudes, a cumulative odds ordinal logistic regression with proportional odds was run to determine the association between NCI and support for biodiversity improvements (Question 13 of the Survey, Appendix 1). Respondents were asked on a short ordinal scale if they would visit their local park more, the same, or less if changes were made which supported biodiversity or enhanced park features. Wildflowers did not meet the test of parallel lines Χ2(2) = 120.024, p < 0.0005, furthermore; there were also many cells with zero frequencies for this variable (64.5%) and so it was not investigated further. The other variables met both tests in addition to goodness of fit and likelihood ratio tests, therefore the ordinal regression model was proceeded with for these four variables. The scale used for the 4 biodiversity improvements had a high level of internal consistency, (Cronbach’s Alpha of 0.717).

The data was analysed using IBM SPSS Statistics 24, (2016) and Microsoft Office Excel 365.

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Results Participants The socio-demographic representation of the sample was compared to countywide data for Cornwall.

Female respondents were over represented in the survey at 62.6%; 10% higher than the overall percentage of females in Cornwall (Cornwall Council, 2017). The survey respondents closely represented the percentage of people in Cornwall in the age categories of 30-39 (15.2%, (16.26% for Cornwall)), 40-49 (18.2%, (18.3% for Cornwall)) and 50-59 (18.2%, (18.3% for Cornwall)). 60-69-year olds were over represented by 6.6% and by a similar 7.58% for those over 70 (Cornwall Council, 2017). The 3 respondents aged between 18 and 19 were not considered as this is measured in a broader age category for the countywide statistics. Self-employed people were under represented in the survey by 13% and there was a large over representation of retired respondents; by 40% compared to the percentage of retired people living in Cornwall (Office for National Statistics, 2017).

Response Rate An overall response rate of 24.88% was achieved for the maildrop survey (total responses 342) which falls in the middle of the range of 20-30% expected for mail drop surveys (Rumsey, 2016). The response rates varied widely across the towns. Camborne had the lowest response rate of 11.85% and Penzance the highest at 32.45%. Whilst the sites at Camborne returned a mean of 8 questionnaires per site, Saltash had a mean overall return rate of 24 questionnaires per site.

Does the frequency of going to parks as a child influence how connected to nature they are as adults?

Of the 137 people who responded to the Spring 2018 round of surveying, N (Frequency of Visit (Weekends)*NCI) = 109, N (Frequency of Visit (After School)*NCI) = 108, N (Frequency of Visit (School Holidays)*NCI) = 103.

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Figure 1: Frequency of Childhood Visits to Greenspaces as a Child

The frequency of responses was consistent across the three segments of available recreation time (Weekends, After School and School Holidays), for each of the levels of frequency (Figure 1). Therefore, if respondents used parks, they used them with the same amount of frequency for each category of available recreation time in childhood. There were small response frequencies for never, rarely and sometimes. The percentage frequencies for ‘All of the time’ for Weekends, (51.7%), After School (50.9%), and School Holidays (54.4%) was almost twice that for ‘Often’ for Weekends, (27.6%), After School (25.0%), and School Holidays (25.9%).

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Figure 2: Bar Charts with 95% CI Error bars for Frequency of Childhood Visit to Greenspace* Mean NCI for Weekends (a), After School (b) and School Holidays (c)

There is a slight upwards trend in mean NCI from ‘Sometimes’ through to ‘All of the time’ (Figure 2 a and c).

For ‘After School’, this includes ‘Rarely’ (Figure 2 b). There were overlapping confidence interval bars for all 3 categories of time available in childhood (Figure 2 a, b and c). The confidence interval is largest for ‘Never’ in Figure 2 (a and c), and rarely in Figure 2 (b).

For each of the 3 segments of available recreation time ‘Weekends’, ‘After School’ and ‘School Holidays’, a Kruskal-Wallis H test was run. This was to determine if there were differences in NCI score between the five groups of participants with different frequencies of visits to parks in childhood: the ‘Never’, ‘Rarely’, ‘Sometimes’, ‘Often’ and ‘All of the Time’ groups for each of the 3 segments of available recreation time. In all 3 cases, distributions of NCI were not similar for all groups, as assessed by visual inspection of a boxplot.

The mean rank of NCI scores was not statistically different between groups for any of the 3 segments of available recreation time (Table 1).

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Table 1: Comparison of Distributions (Kruskal Wallis H Test) for Frequency of Childhood Visit, For Each Segment of Available Recreation Time and NCI

Does taking part in nature-based activities in parks as a child as opposed to non-naturebased activities strengthen their relationship with nature as an adult?

To test this hypothesis, the question ‘When you visited parks prior to the age of 11, what did you do?’ was used and is referred to hereon as ‘Activities’. Out of the 137 respondents to the Spring 2018 round of surveying, 79 people both answered the question about the childhood activities and all 6 statements of the Nature Connection Construct. There was no difference in NCI between people who answered the childhood activity question (Average 73.99 ± 30.799) and those who did not (Average 74.88 ± 29.823).

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Figure 3: Box Plots of Total Number of Nature Based Activities Selected (a) and NCI and Total Number of Activities Selected, Including Nature Based and NCI (b)

(a)

(b)

A positive association between NCI and the number of Nature Based Activities was predicted. However, there was no relationship between NCI and the number of Nature Based Activities selected, or NCI and the Total Number of Activities selected (Figure 3). A Spearman’s Rho correlation was not statistically significant for either grouping (N = 79), whether Nature Based, (ρ = 0.080, p = 0.241) or for the Total Number of Activities selected, (ρ = 0.148, p = 0.097). Therefore, we cannot reject the null hypothesis and cannot accept the alternative hypothesis.

Is there a positive relationship between connection to nature and pro-environmental attitudes, proxied by support for biodiversity improvements in local parks, in adults?

The different biodiversity improvements received a range of responses. Overall support for the biodiversity improvements was high; 45.2% of respondents stating that they would spend more time in their local park if these biodiversity improvements were put in place (Figure 4, mean of ‘More’ responses). ‘More Wildflowers’ was the most popular biodiversity improvement with 55.97% respondents selecting ‘More’.

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‘More Hedges’ was the least popular (31.56%). ‘More Fruit Trees’ was met with the most uncertainty, with the highest percentage of ‘Don’t Know’ responses (Figure 4).

Figure 4: Stacked Bar Chart of Percentage Responses to Support for each Biodiversity Improvement for the question: ‘Would you Spend More Time There If These Biodiversity Improvements Are Put in Place?’

This question used the complete dataset (N=377). The available cases for each of the biodiversity improvements was as follows; respondents who had answered both NCI and ‘More Scattered Trees’, N =186, for NCI*More Hedges 45.4% of responses were included, for NCI*Different Kinds of Vegetation, 49.9% of responses were included and for NCI*More Fruit Trees, 45.6% of responses were included.

For all four of the biodiversity improvements, an increase in NCI was associated with an increase in the odds of respondents stating that they will spend more time in their local park if these biodiversity improvements are put in place. ‘Different Kinds of Vegetation’ is the most significant (Table 2). All the odds ratios are similar, so the relationships with NCI were quite similar across the 4 biodiversity variables.

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However, â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;More Fruit Treesâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; with the least significant result (Table 2), was also the 2nd least favoured biodiversity improvement (Figure 4).

Table 2: Overall Test of Significance and Odds Ratios for the effect of increasing NCI on Support for Biodiversity Improvements

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Discussion This study attempted to investigate the relationship of 2 childhood pathways to nature connectedness in adulthood; frequency of use of parks, and activities undertaken in parks in childhood. These results, as illustrated in Figure 5, demonstrate that neither did frequency of visits to parks in childhood predict Nature Connection, nor did activities in parks in childhood. However, a strong relationship between Nature Connectedness in adulthood and pro-environmental attitudes was found, proxied here as support for biodiversity improvements.

Figure 5: Summary of Results of the Influence of Frequency of Visit and Activities Undertaken in Childhood with Nature Connection and Statistically Significant Result for Adult Pro-Environmental Attitudes with Nature Connection (Wald Chi Squared Value) for Different Kinds of Vegetation and NCI

The questions in the survey on childhood park use were reliant on often distant memories (due to the predominantly older age groups of the respondents) and should be considered with some caution.

Approaches to inferring long term trends from long term memories is a common approach in environmental and social science (Soga & Gaston, 2018) but has reliability issues in assessing environmental

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changes through shifting baseline syndrome (Pauly, 1995). ‘Individual amnesia’ can exaggerate individual perceptions (Daw, 2010), which could account in part for the high frequency of park user visits in childhood and ‘memory illusion’ can mask them (Daw, 2010). The low number of activity responses could in some part be accounted for by this. In addition we have no way to assess the accuracy of the memories of the respondents regarding their childhood experience, or to validate how frequently they visited parks as a child through objective measurement.

Frequency of Use of Parks in Childhood Frequency of use of greenspaces has been found to be an important predictor of nature connection (Lin et al., 2014). The non-statistically significant association found here with Nature Connectedness is consistent with nature connection studies (Beery & Wolf-Watz, 2014; Gosling & Williams, 2010). Because no relationship was found, it is neither possible to determine whether any of the 3 categories of time used here are more important as opportunities for children to be in the outdoors than the other in terms of building their connection to nature. Nor, even if there had been a statistically significant correlation, is it possible to understand from the data whether it is the frequency of park use which would build their nature connection, or whether children with higher nature connection would tend to use parks more.

However, whether it is park use or nature connection which is the key determinant, Ward Thompson et al., (2008), clearly demonstrate that children who use the outdoors continue to do this in adulthood.

The results are consistent with Ward Thompson et al.,(2008), with a high frequency of regular adult users who also used parks frequently in childhood. This shows that people who visit parks as children are building patterns of use which they will continue for the future. It is a consistent theme in the related research that socio-demographic covariates do not impact on time spent in nature (Hinds & Sparks, 2008). However, Cox et al., (2017) found that interactions with the environment increased with age and people aged over 60 had more intentional interactions with parks. This is reflected in the age demographic in the sample of this survey but also reflects the findings of Alves et al., (2008) described below.

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The sample was highly skewed towards frequent park users, who also said they visited frequently as a child.

The relationship with NCI of those who do not use parks was largely excluded and points towards the lack of a statistical correlation for this result, and the overlap in Confidence Interval bars in Figure 2. However, many studies into Nature Connection are self-selecting, and studies which aim to reach non-park users often struggle to do so in reality (Loukaitou-Sideris & Sideris, 2010).

The small quota of respondents who were infrequent users also happened to have high NCI scores and because of the small sample size, we do not know if these are realistic for infrequent users and cannot therefore make generalizations. Ward Thompson et al., (2008), removed the infrequent users from their study into frequency of use as a child and adult use of greenspace which is a limitation of their findings. It was not felt appropriate to do this in this study as the sample size of those in the next category that used the parks ‘Sometimes’ as a child was also not large enough to justify doing this.

This pattern of use has implications for widening the participation of use of parks, which tend to be underutilised (Cohen et al., 2010). If there is a distinct group of people within society who used parks as a child and it is these people that continue to in adulthood (Ward Thompson et al., 2008), then growing the population of park users is about getting more people into parks in their childhood, but as this study shows, not necessarily to increase their connection to nature at this life stage, but to ensure that they use and benefit the most from parks when they are older. The far reaching implication of this is that people who do not receive high nature doses tend to have worse health outcomes but have the potential for the greatest gains from spending longer in nature (Cox et al., 2018).

Activities Done in Parks in Childhood The lack of a relationship found between NCI and activities undertaken in parks is not unsurprising. Wells & Lekies, (2006) found that it was activities undertaken with wild nature prior to the age of 11 which had the most impact on connecting to nature in adulthood. It may be that both the type of activities undertaken and the opportunity to undertake ‘wild’ activities is not available in UK urban parks and so they are not

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fostering these relationships with nature. Indeed, many activities found by Giusti et al., (2018) to be significant nature situations, such as lighting fires and camping are not appropriate activities in the parks studied and so were not included in the survey question. Other places such as zoos, nature reserves and national parks with the increased likelihood of more significant interactions with nature and landscapes (Siikamäki et al., 2015), could be more important to the development of Nature Connection in Childhood than smaller, less impactful interactions in urban local parks.

The respondents were not asked to focus on a particular place, or to describe it in this study and so we do not know the attributes of the parks and open spaces they were remembering when answering the question or what activities were available. Research has shown that Nature Connection is closely correlated with being immersed in nature (Atchley et al., 2012), which may not have been an attribute of the parks that people remembered. The high number of people who scored 100 for their NCI are likely to be getting this Nature Connection from other activity pathways in childhood and through other experiences during their life-course (Restall & Conrad, 2015). However, these findings should not be taken as a reason to diminish the importance of parks as places to be in contact with the natural environment.

It is likely that different age groups are attracted to different parks with different attributes which facilitate different activities. Older people have been found to prefer parks with trees and plants, wildlife to watch and that are well maintained (Alves et al., 2008), whereas 13 year olds, have been found to prefer parks with playground equipment, sports equipment and BMX tracks (Veitch et al., 2015). Parks may therefore not be the place where children go or want to go to interact with nature. Furthermore, Veitch et al., (2015), found that adolescents reported no nature based activities that they engaged in when visiting parks, but this does not mean that they did not engage with nature in other places. The results may reflect the preferences of the older demographic of the participants, finding no association with NCI and the activities in childhood, but accounting in part for the high support for biodiversity improvements in line with Alves et al., (2008) findings.

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However, few studies have considered the activities undertaken in parks by children in relation to nature, instead focussing on parks as places for physical activity for young people (Edwards et al., 2015; Reed & Hooker, 2012; Ding et al., 2011; Floyd et al., 2011; Babey et al., 2008; Cohen et al., 2006). Loukaitou-Sideris & Sideris, (2010) assert that parks are places where children can explore nature but do not consider this any further in their study. Moreover, studying nature connection pathways in children is more often linked to education than recreational time (Karpudewan & Mohd Ali Khan, 2017; Otto & Pensini, 2017; Sellmann & Bogner, 2013; Ernst & Theimer, 2011), therefore this has been an early attempt to examine the extent to which parks formulise nature connection in children, by questioning what people do there as children.

The question on activities received one of the lowest response rates of the whole questionnaire (N=86, 62%). Considering the effect of the order of the questions; the question before on frequency of childhood park use was N=116, (85%) and the subsequent question regarding who people went to parks with as a child was N=127, (93%) and so the reasons for this reduced number of responses are unclear. Further testing of this question perhaps through interviewing rather than maildrop survey could improve the response rate and elicit more detailed findings. Ward Thompson et al., (2008) addressed the question of activities through qualitative surveying and suggest that the open questions they used, gave respondents the opportunity to talk in depth about their experiences. This method of recall was not available to the respondents of the maildrop questionnaire in this study, although, our study had a larger sample.

There are opportunities in the research into nature connection, beyond questionnaire surveying, to throw light on where the best places are for people, at various life stages, to connect with nature for developing environmental policy and practice (Restall & Conrad, 2015). Observing people in different kinds of natural environments; e.g. parks, national parks, nature reserves, zoos and urban areas whilst rating the characteristics of the observed activities on a nature-based-activities scale, could achieve much insight into which environments are the most effective pathways for Nature Connection. This could be an expansion of SOPARC developed by McKenzie & Cohen, (2006). If formulated into a spatial model, it would add a human ecosystem service of areas important for connecting with nature, lending a new criterion of status to these

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places in an economic climate where as Reeves, (2000) emphasises, resources for parks are becoming more and more scarce.

Attitudes to Biodiversity The relationship between NCI and support for the biodiversity improvements was strongly positively associated for each of the biodiversity improvements. This reflects the body of the field of research that NCI’s key importance is in its relationship with positive attitudes and behaviours towards the environment (Restall & Conrad, 2015). As Hunter & Rinner, (2004) found, the individuals here with a stronger ecocentric perspective placed greater priority on biodiversity relative to those with a weaker Connection to Nature.

The 4 improvements in this study were each about different kinds of vegetation and each had different levels of popularity although they were all strongly significantly associated with increasing NCI. The options of ‘More Fruit Trees’ and ‘More Hedges’, were the least significant results and both were the least popular biodiversity improvements. Both of these reactions may link to perceptions of safety which have been found to be key determinants of park enjoyment (Seaman et al., 2010). Fruit left on the ground may be felt to be a slip hazard, and hedges may be felt to be too dense a park feature (Bjerke et al., 2006). This reflects the findings of Shanahan et al., (2015) that there are different preferences for different kinds of landscapes but people’s preferences do not reflect the best habitats for biodiversity.

Dallimer et al., (2012), found poor levels of biodiversity knowledge and in addition, it has been found that people’s nature connection does not reflect a high knowledge of biodiversity (Muratet et al., 2015; Luck et al., 2011). This demonstrates that respondents may not have fully understood the options presented in this study; a possible reason for the highest preference for the most varied option, ‘Different Kinds of Vegetation’, which would also translate as to being the most moderately dense vegetation option, as has been found to be preferred in other studies (Bjerke et al., 2006).

22

It is interesting that with so many people reporting a high nature connection as found here and by Hunt et al., (2017), so little is being done for the environment. Studies into Nature Connection and Behaviours, have not all found that pro-environmental attitudes translate into pro-environmental behaviour (Otto & Pensini, 2017). In addition, Shwartz et al., (2014) found that increasing biodiversity in local parks, although successful in itself for conservation, had a limited impact on changing perceptions with no differences found before and after biodiversity improvement interventions. Indeed, in this study, NCI scores were already strong (N = 138, NCI > 70) without the biodiversity improvements being in place, making it difficult to foresee an increase in NCI in the population post improvements. It would be interesting to analyse if there is any regionality in NCI and pro-environmental attitudes and whether these results for Cornwall are representative for the rest of the UK (Beery & Wolf-Watz, 2014). This could be done through analysing the Hunt et al., (2017) data used in the national survey. An extension of this could also be used to target research into any geographic areas at the landscape scale which are important for the development of nature connectedness.

A criticism of Dunn et al., (2006) is that if people are having less contact with nature, and Nature Connection Scales are a reliable and valid measurement tool (Perrin & Benassi, 2009), this is not translating into lower Nature Connection Scores in urban populations. Indeed the high levels of nature connection found here, may demand little need to improve or increase these rates of NCI scores by increasing the biodiversity of these places, and rather the driver to improve the biodiversity of these sites would be as Dadvand et al., (2016) suggest, to improve the well-being of greenspace visitors.

If the parks are improved for biodiversity, they will afford more opportunities for interactions with nature whilst visitors are in them (Shanahan et al., 2015), which may be likely to suit the needs of the older population the most (Alves et al., 2008). Future research should look at the opportunities that parks provide to enhance peopleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s interactions with nature for promoting Nature Connection and positive attitudes to the environment. As Fuller et al., (2007) note, more understanding of the reasons that different greenspaces vary dramatically in their contribution needs to be made, to understand what attributes

23

contribute the most to their user populations in affording the best experiences and this should then be used to inform park design and ensure that changes do not push one user group out in favour of another.

Nature Connectedness The human relationship with nature is complex and whilst humans are reliant on nature for their health and wellbeing, this is a reciprocal relationship where nature is also reliant on humans (Davis et al., 2009).

Connectedness to Nature Scales were developed to measure this complex relationship, often from different standpoints, but to operationalise the underlying role that subjective human cognitive connection has in this relationship (Pasca et al., 2017).

The results of the NCI in this study are in themselves interesting and Connectedness to Nature Scales have been considered to be an important predictor of ecological behaviour (Mayer & Frantz, 2004). However it would be worthy research to explore why there is a common pattern of people scoring highly for each of the 6 questions which constitute the scale as found here and by Hunt et al., (2017). Other studies have also found a high rate of nature connectedness in their populations (Howell et al., 2011). Are people answering what they want the surveyor to hear, or is there an artificial construct being created by the overall survey or society, that is pushing them toward answering these questions positively (Bradburn et al., 2004)? Are the scores simply a result of the upwelling of people caring about their environment (Stern et al., 1995)?

Notwithstanding the small sample, the distribution of the NCI scores was similar to that found by (Hunt et al., 2017), with the mode being a maximum index score of 100. Furthermore, of the 206 respondents included who had answered all six statements, 48.5% had a maximum NCI of 100. This is greater than the national sample generated by Hunt et al., (2017). However, in addition to this, there was also a high number of people who did not respond to all six questions of the construct (23.4%) who were therefore not included. This measure of NCI may not have been the most suitable for this sample size.

The literature would suggest that the scale used is itself likely to be effective. Pasca et al. (2017), found that a scale with around half a dozen elements reduced duplication and redundancy and was more reliable,

24

which reflects the scale used here. However, a small improvement to ensure that the scale reflects beliefs rather than emotional connection to nature would be to remove the word ‘feel’, (Perrin & Benassi, 2009).

Nevertheless, this word appears only once in the scale used. Overall, however a method of measurement should be devised which can better assess the differences within those who are highly connected to nature (Andrews, 2018).

Conclusion The evidence presented here illustrates that childhood park use seems to have little influence on adults’ cognitive relationships with nature. However, childhood park users continue to use parks in adulthood.

Adults’ relationships with nature do seem to align with concerns about the biodiversity of their local area, and taken together with the body of related research, those with higher levels of connection to nature will be able to get the best outcomes from using their local greenspace.

Taking Nature Connectedness Scales as a reliable method of measuring human cognitive connection with the natural world (Pasca et al., 2017), the results of this paper show that adults with higher levels of nature connection are more likely to support improvements which aim to enhance biodiversity in their local area.

This connection to nature must be formulated during some life course point (Wells & Lekies, 2006), however, our findings have not determined that childhood park use is involved.

Although parks are important to older people as a place to interact with nature (Alves et al., 2008), the role of recreational visits and activities in childhood in parks may be less important to the development of nature connectedness. This is demonstrated by the high rate of NCI we found in adults, who are likely to be establishing this in other ways and through other stimuli (Cox et al., 2017). However, the evidence presented here shows how important it is that people are cognitively connected to the natural world, as this makes them more likely to want to improve it.

25

People are sensitive to different kinds of vegetation (Shanahan et al., 2015), which should be taken into account by those involved in planning and designing parks. Although people may not understand the biodiversity value at a detailed level (Muratet et al., 2015), increasing this in parks is likely to increase opportunities for urban human populations to interact more with nature. This can only increase the likelihood of people developing their Connectedness to Nature. At a time when the natural world is increasingly threatened, parks are likely to play an ever more important role in promoting positive human relationships with it. Parksâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; biodiversity value should be improved to both support nature and positive human attitudes towards it (Dallimer et al., 2012).

Ethics The research methods were accepted by the Ethics Committee of the University of Exeter and considered according to the British Psychological Society Guidelines for ethical practices in psychological research.

Acknowledgements This paper was produced with the support of Cornwall Councilâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Green Infrastructure For Growth Project (GI4G), the European Union Regional Development Fund and the Environment & Sustainability Institute, University of Exeter.

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Appendix 1: Relevant Questions from the Questionnaire Q11 Nature Connectedness Scale (Research questions 1, 2 and 3)

11. The following questions are about you and how you enjoy the

natural environment. By natural environment we mean green open spaces in towns and cities as well as the coast and countryside. How much do you disagree or agree with the following statements?

Strongly disagree 1

2

3

4

5

6

Strongly agree 7

I always find beauty in nature I always treat nature with respect Being in nature makes me very happy Spending time in nature is very important to me I find being in nature really amazing I feel part of nature Q12 Biodiversity Improvements and Park Features (Research Q3)

12. In terms of location, if the following changes were made in your local green spaces, would you spend more or less time there?

More Less Same Donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t know Site is busier with more people More paths Better path surface Better parking More seating More wildflowers [*] More scattered trees [*] More hedges [*] More information signs i

Different kinds of vegetation (mix of trees, flowers and grass) [*} More fruit trees [*] Additional pond/s [**] Bird nest and bat roost boxes [**] Other, please specify: * - selected as a biodiversity improvement ** - Not included as added for future surveying

Q15 Frequency of Childhood Visit (Research Q1) We would like to find out about how you used parks as a child.

15. Between the age of 9 and 11, how often did you visit parks and open spaces?

Please put 1 tick in each column How often?

Weekends After School School Holidays    A) All of the time    B) Often    C) Sometimes

D) Rarely E) Never

 

 

 

Q17 Activities undertaken in parks as a child (Research Q2)

17.When you went to parks and open spaces, aged 9-11 what did you do? Please tick all that apply  A) Played games  B) Played organised sport or school sportsday  C) Using the playground  D) Picnicking E) Doing nature activites e.g. collecting conkers,  or blackberries [*]  F) Feeding the ducks or other animals [*]  G) Making dens / houses [*]  H) Climbing Trees [*]  I) Doing supervised nature activities e.g. pond dipping, bulb or tree planting [*] ii

J) Walking the dog K) Walking (not with a dog) L) Getting some peace and quiet M) Riding your bicycle / skateboarding N) Other reasons, please specify:

   

* - Nature Activity

iii