Effects of Childhood Location and Environmental Education on Wildlife Knowledge Jennifer Taylor Abstract Urban sprawl in the San Francisco Bay Area has increased dramatically in recent decades. As new housing and office developments reduce the amount of open space in the region, people begin to lose their connection to their environment and to the wildlife that lives in this open space. This study examines how growing up among areas of open space and being able to participate in formal environmental education programs and informal environmental activities in open space affects what people know about Bay Area wildlife. A self-administered survey of 307 visitors to Bay Area city, county, regional, and state parks was used to acquire the data. Survey participants were given knowledge scores based on their responses to five wildlife related questions. This study concludes that people who spent their childhood in a suburban area have the highest wildlife knowledge score compared to those from rural, small town, or city backgrounds. A significant relationship was found between knowledge score and past participation in formal environmental education programs in local, state, and national parks. Knowledge scores were also significantly higher with increased frequency of participation in informal environmental activities. This study concludes that people do learn more about wildlife when they are able to interact with open space. Therefore, urban sprawl needs to be managed so that open space, along with the wildlife living within it, is preserved for future generations to maintain a connection to Bay Area wildlife.Introduction Many people come to the San Francisco Bay Area to live in a place of great ecological diversity, where the local wildlife is an important part of the environment (Rogers 2003). The population of the Bay Area is growing at a rate of about 600,000 people per year (Rogers 2003) and as more people come to the Bay Area to take advantage of all the opportunities that it presents, they need a place to live. As offices are being built farther towards the edges of major cities like San Jose, new residents must live in areas that were previously farming areas, open space, or land that was primarily used for recreation or environmental education programs (Scenic America 2001, elect. comm.). As urban sprawl increases in the Bay Area, wildlife is being displaced or injured (Wildlife Center of Silicon Valley 2003, elect. comm.). While many people say that the presence of native wildlife is one of the attributes of the area that they hope to maintain in the future, they also say there is a lack of housing and that more land should be developed (Witt 2000). Housing and office developments have been built or are in the planning stages for many acres of open space (Boulton 2001). One of the most controversial examples of this is the office complex that is in the planning stages for the Coyote Valley in San Jose. If this complex is built, it will affect the range of many wildlife species in the area and will be very harmful to the health of the regional ecosystem (Boulton 2001). When this and many other new structures are built on or near open land in the Bay Area, wildlife is at an increased risk of injury or death because there are many more people, cars, and domestic animals around than there used to be (Wildlife Center of Silicon Valley 2003, elect. comm.). In order to show the significance of preserving open space, this study will examine the relationship between the exposure people have had to open space and the knowledge that they possess about wildlife commonly found in this space. For the purposes of this study, contact with the natural environment can come in the form of living in an area surrounded by open space, participating in formal environmental education programs, or participating in environmentally related activities in various forms of open space. A survey was conducted of visitors to five Bay Area parks: Alum Rock, Big Basin, Sanborn, Tilden, and Vasona. One intention of this study is to determine if growing up in a rural area, with more open space and wildlife present, increases one’s knowledge. If living in the midst of open space does increase knowledge, open space needs to be preserved. To address this intention, thisstudy measures how much spending childhood years in an urban or rural location affects that person’s knowledge of wildlife. The second intention of this study is to investigate the effect that participating in environmental education has on wildlife knowledge. The survey analyzes how either participating in formal environmental education programs through schools and other agencies, or participating in informal environmental education experiences through camping and other independent activities affects knowledge. These two questions are both related to the question of determining what kind of experiences people learn best from. They are both equally important questions since all of the factors studied could have played a part in determining a person’s knowledge about wildlife. One of the purposes of this research is to show that preserving open space is necessary because people can learn about wildlife from their presence in open space in their community. Previous studies have concluded that the more knowledge people have about wildlife, the more likely they are to support conservation efforts (Aipanjiguly et al. 2003). These conservation efforts in turn lead to environmental legislation being created (Vaske et al. 1999), which can save wildlife and create more open space for more people to learn in. The second purpose of this study is to show that environmental education programs also help to increase knowledge about wildlife. One of the most important ways to save wildlife is to educate the public about the effects of urban sprawl through environmental outreach programs (Wildlife Center of Silicon Valley 2003, elect. comm.). It has been shown that the general public lacks the information needed to address wildlife conservation issues (Bleich et al. 2000). Even with non-profit wildlife centers like the Wildlife Center of Silicon Valley offering to educate the public about the effects of urban sprawl on wildlife, some groups still believe that environmental education in schools and in communities is an unnecessary waste of time and money (Ruben 1994). While there has been previous research showing that people with the
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