>>SUSAN CLAYTON: My name’s Susan Clayton and I’m a conservation psychologist.
Conservation psychology is the use of all areas of psychology to try to better understand
the human relationship with the natural world and then to use that knowledge to try and
protect and conserve our natural resources.
Science is why I wanted to become a psychologist because I really love data.
I love the idea that you can ask questions and then you can get data to answer them or
you can formulate hypotheses and then you can test the hypotheses.
What I wanted to do was really ask questions and then use scientific research to answer
those questions.
I had had a personal interest in nature that I didn't associate at all with psychology
as I was being trained as a psychologist and I began to realize that there was a real psychological
significance to nature that I hadn't appreciated beforehand.
So, just from a theoretical point of view, I really wanted to explore that.
What I’m particularly interested in is the kind of personal and social significance of
the natural world.
So why does it matter to people, in terms of their identity and how they think about
themselves?
And also, how does the natural world exist in social interactions?
One of the most important characteristics of human thinking is that we tend to focus
on the short term – and this made sense in the environment in which we were evolving
because surviving to the next day was the most important thing.
Now that we can be pretty sure that we are not going to get eaten by tigers overnight
and that we will have enough food to survive for the next week or two, we really need to
think about the future, but we’re just not in the habit of doing so.
So I think the best way to try and get beyond that bias is to somehow link the future to
things that people care about more immediately.
I've done a lot of research at zoos.
People go to the zoo.
They’re experiencing wild animals – they’re experiencing lush vegetation and for them
it really is nature.
So I like to look at the ways in which they respond to those natural elements.
And I do that by just watching them and coding their behavior – by listening to them and
also by surveying them and asking them direct questions.
I have concluded, based on my observations, for one, the majority of people are happy
and they’re having a good time.
The second thing that I've learned is that people are trying to connect with the animals
in some way.
They value their interactions with animals and they have these interactions with them
in a social context.
They’re using the animal to have an interaction with the other person.
And what that interaction allows is a communication of shared values.
One thing that my research seems to be indicating is that the signs that describe the animals
can affect the way that people respond to the animals in a way that makes them receptive
to a conservation message.
Right now, there’s a wildlife exhibit at a zoo in Chengdu, China, which was designed
partly on the basis of some data I collected a few summers ago there about people’s attitudes
towards the wildlife trade.
And the hope is that this exhibit will actually change people’s attitudes – lead them
to be more active against the wildlife trade and therefore protect the animals.
If we can have even a small effect on the Chinese zoo-going audience, given how many
people there are in China, it could be translated into a very big effect.
The idea that research in conservation psychology can help to inform better messaging is really
exciting to me.
To emphasize and in fact, protect nature can actually not just be good for nature, but
it can be a very rewarding and satisfying experience and contribute to your own sense
of connectedness and to your own well-being in some sense.
One of the areas of research that’s really booming in the past 10 or 15 years is research
demonstrating that feeling connected to nature, being outside in nature, has a positive impact
on people.
It reduces their stress – it makes them happier, perhaps more productive.
Even more physically healthy.
They’ll live longer.
They have better social relationships.
That’s part of the message that people need to have.
It’s just that nature is important to our ability to live healthy and satisfying lives.
I went into psychology because people are just endlessly fascinating.
I have a much higher opinion of people based on psychological research because I know how
capable people are of kindness and the desire for justice and empathy.
Every time I’m doing research, I find things that surprise me.
What I love most about my work has to be the potential to make a difference.
It’s just so satisfying to think that things I learn can be applied to actually change
people’s behavior – that my research might actually help in a small way to protect the
environment and therefore to provide healthy environments for people and wildlife into
the future.
And that’s science in action.