Poster #59 - Children's Conservation Attitudes After Visiting an Animal Hospital Exhibit

• In Event: Poster Session 16

Abstract

Children with high connectedness to nature hold more empathy, animal-nature-human oneness beliefs (e.g., people cannot live without plants and animals), and individual responsibility for conservation (Hughes et al., 2018). Children’s nature connectedness is related to their interactions with the natural world (e.g., free action and promoted action; Reed, 1996) Free action allows children to choose how to play in nature, directed by children’s curiosity, and promotes intrinsic desires for conservation. Conversely, promoted action is nature learning that is led by parents or educators. The present study examined children's environmental attitudes and beliefs after visiting an Animal Hospital Exhibit, an exhibit that allows for both free and promoted actions, at a local Science Center.
Fifty-six 5- to 10-year-olds (M age = 7.78) were assigned to one of two conditions: Procedure (n = 30) or Walkthrough (n = 26). Children in the Procedure condition watched a live veterinary procedure, which included narration and education from the veterinarian and staff educator. They were able to interact with and ask questions to the veterinarian and educator. Children in the Walkthrough condition explored the animal hospital exhibit when no procedure was taking place. After both conditions, participants were asked a conservation attitude question “How worried do you feel about animals going extinct?” This was scored on a 3-point Likert scale of “not at all”, “a little”, and “very”. Then they were asked a series of questions about their experience in the exhibit (e.g., how curious did you feel…) and animal-human body similarities (e.g., how similar is a snake’s heart to your…).
A 2 (condition: Procedure or Walkthrough) x 2 (age: 5-7 or 8-10 years) between-subjects ANOVA revealed a significant main effect of condition on conservation attitudes, F(1,50) = 5.29, p < .001, ɳp2 = .10. Procedure condition children (M = 2.80, SD =.38) held higher conservation attitudes compared to Walkthrough condition children (M = 2.38, SD =.82). Children’s conservation attitudes may have been impacted by the direct interaction with staff and the up-close view of animal care. Alternatively, children in the Procedure condition could have begun the study with stronger conservation attitudes. These children may have been more willing to watch the live veterinary procedure based on a pre-existing interest in animals and nature.
In addition, children’s conservation attitudes were correlated with their curiosity about the hospital exhibit r(56) = .38, p = .004 and their belief in human-animal similarity r(56) = .41, p = .002. These results are consistent with previous research that has shown that conservation is related to children’s beliefs about human-animal connections (Hughes et al., 2018) and curiosity about nature (Clayton, 2012). Empathy and a passion for conservation may be fostered by both a desire to learn about nature and beliefs regarding human-animal similarities.

Authors

• Lindsay Genevieve Jarvis, University of North Carolina at Greensboro
  Presenting Author

• Jessica Stark Caporaso, University of North Carolina at Greensboro

• Janet J Boseovski, University of North Carolina at Greensboro

• Anjali Pradeep, University of North Carolina at Greensboro

• Lindsey Zarecky