Details
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | e0276432 |
| Journal | PLOS ONE |
| Volume | 17 |
| Issue number | 10 October |
| Publication status | Published - 27 Oct 2022 |
| Externally published | Yes |
Abstract
ASJC Scopus subject areas
Sustainable Development Goals
Cite this
- Standard
- Harvard
- Apa
- Vancouver
- BibTeX
- RIS
In: PLOS ONE, Vol. 17, No. 10 October, e0276432, 27.10.2022.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › Research › peer review
}
TY - JOUR
T1 - Perceptions of ecosystem services: Comparing socio-cultural and environmental influences
AU - Thiemann, Miriam
AU - Riebl, Rebekka
AU - Haensel, Maria
AU - Schmitt, Thomas M.
AU - Steinbauer, Manuel J.
AU - Landwehr, Theresa
AU - Fricke, Ute
AU - Redlich, Sarah
AU - Koellner, Thomas
N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2022 Thiemann et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
PY - 2022/10/27
Y1 - 2022/10/27
N2 - Ecosystem services such as food provisioning, climate regulation, nutrient cycling, or recreation in open landscapes underpin human wellbeing. They are highly dependent on land use, land cover and utilization pattern as well as environmental factors like climate, topography and soil. In consequence, ecosystem services supply shows a high spatial variability. However, it is less clear if the perception of the importance of ecosystem services is similarly heterogeneous in space and amongst societal actors. The aim of this large-scale study was to explore whether land cover and climate gradients as well as socio-cultural factors influence the perceptions of ecosystem services of four groups of societal actors: citizens, farmers, foresters and nature managers. Spatially explicit survey data of 3018 respondents allowed to gain insight into the distribution of perceived importance of 21 ecosystem services in the federal state of Bavaria, Germany together with the respondents’ socio-cultural characterisation (e.g. gender, education and hobbies in nature). Responses were analysed through descriptive statistics, redundancy analysis, and Generalized Linear Models. Results reveal that the perceived importance of many ecosystem services was consistently high across groups, although perception differed for some ecosystem services (e.g. production of energy plants and timber as well as recreation in urban green space). Compared to other actor groups, farmers attributed slightly lower importance to all ES except provisioning services. Socio-cultural factors better explained variability in perceived importance of ecosystem services than land cover and climate gradients. This might be either explained by the fact that the environmental gradients vary not strong enough in our case study or that they do not shape the perceptions of respondents. A limitation of the study is that the sample of respondents obtained is not representative for the population, but biased towards persons interested in the topics of the survey. Still the consensus indicated by the overall positive perception of ecosystem services among respondents highlights the integrative potential of ecosystem services when included in decision-making.
AB - Ecosystem services such as food provisioning, climate regulation, nutrient cycling, or recreation in open landscapes underpin human wellbeing. They are highly dependent on land use, land cover and utilization pattern as well as environmental factors like climate, topography and soil. In consequence, ecosystem services supply shows a high spatial variability. However, it is less clear if the perception of the importance of ecosystem services is similarly heterogeneous in space and amongst societal actors. The aim of this large-scale study was to explore whether land cover and climate gradients as well as socio-cultural factors influence the perceptions of ecosystem services of four groups of societal actors: citizens, farmers, foresters and nature managers. Spatially explicit survey data of 3018 respondents allowed to gain insight into the distribution of perceived importance of 21 ecosystem services in the federal state of Bavaria, Germany together with the respondents’ socio-cultural characterisation (e.g. gender, education and hobbies in nature). Responses were analysed through descriptive statistics, redundancy analysis, and Generalized Linear Models. Results reveal that the perceived importance of many ecosystem services was consistently high across groups, although perception differed for some ecosystem services (e.g. production of energy plants and timber as well as recreation in urban green space). Compared to other actor groups, farmers attributed slightly lower importance to all ES except provisioning services. Socio-cultural factors better explained variability in perceived importance of ecosystem services than land cover and climate gradients. This might be either explained by the fact that the environmental gradients vary not strong enough in our case study or that they do not shape the perceptions of respondents. A limitation of the study is that the sample of respondents obtained is not representative for the population, but biased towards persons interested in the topics of the survey. Still the consensus indicated by the overall positive perception of ecosystem services among respondents highlights the integrative potential of ecosystem services when included in decision-making.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85140865203&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1371/journal.pone.0276432
DO - 10.1371/journal.pone.0276432
M3 - Article
VL - 17
JO - PLOS ONE
JF - PLOS ONE
SN - 1932-6203
IS - 10 October
M1 - e0276432
ER -