Common and threatened animal identification and conservation preferences among 6 to 12 year-old students

Biodiversity loss is one of the biggest environmental issues in the world today and the biodiversity literacy of citizens can be key to counteracting this. Considering that children can be change agents and actively take part in decision-making from early years, we have assessed the native fauna ide...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores: Barrutia Sarasua, Oihana, Pedrera Diez, Oier, Ortega Lasuen, Unai, Díez López, José Ramón
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Fecha de publicación:2023
País:España
Institución:Universidad del País Vasco
Repositorio:Addi. Archivo Digital para la Docencia y la Investigación
OAI Identifier:oai:addi.ehu.eus:10810/68934
Acceso en línea:http://hdl.handle.net/10810/68934
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:biodiversity education
native fauna
species identification
species conservation
primary school
Descripción
Sumario:Biodiversity loss is one of the biggest environmental issues in the world today and the biodiversity literacy of citizens can be key to counteracting this. Considering that children can be change agents and actively take part in decision-making from early years, we have assessed the native fauna identification skills of Primary School students (aged 6–12 years-old; n = 1975) from northern Spain along with their conservation preferences regarding common and threatened species. We have observed that, despite students’ species literacy increasing with the education level, it remains overall very low. Besides, the conservation preferences of children are not exclusively guided by conservation priorities and, although are partially explained by species identification accuracy, other factors also seem to skew these preferences. These findings point out the need to properly address knowledge of local fauna from the early school years and the urgent need to provide children with the appropriate training regarding the characteristics to be taken into account when selecting species for protection and ensure their conservation.