An academic research page.
Using environmental, social, and positive psychology to promote stronger connections to the world around us.
Category: connectedness to nature
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Longing for nature: Nostalgia & Nature Connectedness
If you think back to your childhood and recall an experience in nature—especially a nice one—odds are you’ll feel something that is an odd mix of fondness but also longing to experience that exact moment again. A sweetness shaded with a slight bitterness knowing that the moment is gone. Nostalgia. Our recent research suggests that…
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Making Evaluation Easier for Small Nature-Based Initiatives
There are currently many nature-based initiatives (NBIs) operating in the public sector, all with the aim of reconnecting people with nature and improving wellbeing. While they share common aims, they are, by the very nature of these things, currently separate. While each of these NBIs are more than free to collect their own data to…
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Societal factors that influence nature connectedness
For the most part, psychologists tend to study individuals. And, for this reason, most nature connection research has tended to focus on the specific factors in individual’s lives (e.g., time outside, age, screen time, etc) that influence individual’s levels of nature connectedness. This is, of course, very important as the world is made up of…
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The Features of Nature That Connect Us
In our most recently accepted paper, Mile’s Richardson, Jack Hughes, and myself did some more network analyses. This time, instead of focusing on emotions and activities, like we did in our first network study, we instead focused on the natural features that seemed to most distinguish highly nature-connective experiences from ones that were a bit…
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The most ‘nature connective’ emotions and activities
Nature connectedness is influenced by an incredibly complex array of factors, from the activities we engage in, to the features of the places in which we engage them (paper forthcoming), and even to the emotions those places and activities evoke (see this paper for a thorough review). To put it simply, there is a web—or…
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Human–Nature Relationships: More than just contact with nature
There has been a promising new trend in both UK (Dasgupta, 2021) and international policy (EEA, 2022, SEI & CEEW, 2022; Convention on Biological Diversity, 2022): emphasizing the human–nature relationship and nature connectedness as important targets. Given the robust evidence of strong relationship between nature connectedness and both human (e.g., Pritchard et al., 2020) and…
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Post-Travel Reflections, self-transcendence, & charitable donations
Can we encourage recent travelers to donate to protect humans and nature?
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Eudaimonia & Connectedness to nature
What type of positive experiences most influence connectedness
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Outdoor experiences, self-awareness, & connectedness to nature
Does spending time in nature increase connectedness because it impacts the way that we think about ourselves?
