Abstract
Direct experiences with nature in childhood are essential for enhancing psychological and physical development in children. However, researches on childhood nature-related experiences and their effects are largely biased toward more developed Western countries. In this study, we created a questionnaire on childhood experiences with nature and surveyed 357 adults (>20 years old) around Kuala Lumpur, the capital of Malaysia, to determine whether younger generations had fewer nature-based experiences than older generations and whether people who grew up in urban areas had fewer experiences than those who grew up in rural areas. We found that playing in rivers or waterfalls and collecting and eating tropical fruits were the most common nature-related activities experienced in childhood. There was a minimal decline in nature-related experiences among generations. However, people who grew up in rural areas had more nature-related experiences than those who grew up in urban areas. The loss of nature areas and increase in population density may accelerate the decline in nature-related experiences in urban areas. Therefore, efforts to create urban parks and other public spaces for reconnecting urban children to nature will become increasingly important for urban planning and environmental education in tropical developing countries such as Malaysia.
Highlights
More than half of the global population lives in cities
The most common childhood nature-related activity in Peninsular Malaysia was playing in rivers or waterfalls
Our results suggest that childhood nature activities such as playing in fresh water, observing animals, collecting tropical fruits, and other plant materials are popular among children in Malaysia, and spaces for these activities would likely be well-accepted by local residents
Summary
More than half of the global population lives in cities. As such, urban biodiversity conservation must be utilized to prevent the “extinction of experience” cycle, whereby people who do not have the opportunity to interact with nature are less likely to value and appreciate nature, leading to a decline in public support for conservation activities and further degradation of natural environments [1, 2].Direct experiences with nature have substantial positive impacts on the mental, emotional, and social development of children [3, 4] and people’s behavior [5] and can encourage healthy lifestyles [6,7,8,9]. Experience with nature in childhood is important for cultivating proenvironmental attitudes, behaviors, and moral judgments later in life [10,11,12,13,14]. In the current “extinction of experience” era, it is important to understand how children relate to nature and how this connection has changed over time and among various sociodemographics. This is urgent in developing countries experiencing rapid urbanization. Our understanding of childhood nature-related experiences is largely biased toward more developed Western countries. Southeast Asia is a rapidly urbanizing region that has experienced drastic changes in and degradation of natural landscapes in the past few decades (e.g., [18])
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