Interactions between human behaviour and ecological systems

Abstract

Research on the interactions between human behaviour and ecological systems tends to focus on the direct effects of human activities on ecosystems, such as biodiversity loss. There is also increasing research effort directed towards ecosystem services. However, interventions to control people's use of the environment alter the incentives that natural resource users face, and therefore their decisions about resource use. The indirect effects of conservation interventions on biodiversity, modulated through human decision-making, are poorly studied but are likely to be significant and potentially counterintuitive. This is particularly so where people are dependent on multiple natural resources for their livelihoods, when both poverty and biodiversity loss are acute. An inter-disciplinary approach is required to quantify these interactions, with an understanding of human decision-making at its core; otherwise, predictions about the impacts of conservation policies may be highly misleading.

Figure 1.

Conceptual model of the links between stakeholder (landowner or farming or grouse shooting tenants) reactions to scenarios of policy or economic change and the conservation value of the UK's North Pennines Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. ‘Landscape’ is the proportion of different vegetation types in the area and ‘action’ refers to stakeholder actions that might affect Biodiversity Action Plan species distributions through means other than changes in the configuration of the vegetation, such as changed grazing regimes altering the level of disturbance. Adapted from Black [15].

Figure 2.

Flow diagram for the management strategy evaluation framework comprising a resource operating model (simulating the ‘true’ population biology of the species), the observation model to monitor the species (with error) and the management model, using information about the stock to create and implement harvest control rules. In the extended model, the harvest control rule is fed into an additional harvester operating model that allows for individual decision-making by harvesters and monitoring of harvester behaviour.