Connecting with nature Reversing decline 'will entail radical policy change'

Individuals' connection to nature has declined by more than 60% since 1800, almost exactly mirroring the disappearance of nature words such as river, moss and blossom from books, according to a study.

- Patrick Barkham

Computer modelling predicts that levels of nature connectedness will continue to decline unless there are far-reaching policy and societal changes - with introducing children to nature at a young age and radically greening urban environments the most effective interventions.

The study, by Miles Richardson, professor of nature connectedness at the University of Derby, tracks the loss of nature from people's lives over 220 years by using data on urbanisation, the loss of wildlife in neighbourhoods and, crucially, parents no longer passing on engagement with nature to their children.

In the research, published in the journal Earth, Richardson also identifies the disappearance of natural words from books between 1800 and 2020, which peaked at a 60.6% decline in 1990.

The modelling predicts an "extinction of experience", with future generations continuing to lose an awareness of nature because it is not present in increasingly built-up neighbourhoods, while parents no longer pass on an "orientation" towards the natural world.