9 ms·

Children who play outside more likely to protect nature as adults

181 points by devinp 10y ago

tradersam 10y ago
I'm curious to know if there is a correlation between climate change deniers and playing outside as well.
- arketyp 10y ago
  Would that, so to speak, be a negative correlation? Seeing how today the no-questions-asked progressive dogma of the deepest concrete city dwellers seems to be to accept even the worst painted climate change scenarios.
  - crooked-v 10y ago
    For city dwellers, seeing the negative effect of mankind on the environment is as simple as leaving a window open in summer and having to regularly wipe a coating of black dust off the windowsill.
    - arketyp 10y ago
      Yes. I would guess, because of this, city dwellers are more susceptible to the idea of anthropogenic effects, while people in rural areas in contrast are used to witnessing a more resilient character in nature.
      - sudojudo 10y ago
        Rural anecdote from the northwest: The stream I played in as a kid is now polluted by a feed lot. Cattle are everywhere. Invasive weeds are also everywhere. Native insects are dying off, while their replacements decimate forests, one mountain at a time, heading north. The rivers and streams are full of plastic and algal bloom. Finding a tree that's more than fifty years old is neat. There was a giant fish die-off in the rivers last year. Everyone wants a few acres of their own, but they also want water and sewer, in a nice neighborhood, not too far from town. Subdivisions even trump cattle, the only thing that will beat those out is a natural resource that can be exploited. There are a dozen other environmental issues I could extrapolate on, that are happening just outside my back door, and I live in BFE. Good times in rural America, nature is really holding up. This whole city vs. country argument is silly. It's not another species out here; some people care about the environment and some don't, just like anywhere. Will rural populations stay behind the curve on some issues? Of course, but they're still people, like you.
- DoodleBuggy 10y ago
  There's certainly a high correlation between belief in science and education as well as how much garbage media is consumed.
Razengan 10y ago
I almost never played outside, and I didn't even grow up around "nature" — in garbage-plagued cities, in fact, but maybe that has made me want to protect nature anyway.
HenryBemis 10y ago
There is also a misconception of what "nature" is. Mega-city-dwellers going for a walk to a park and throwing their empty-soda-can in a bin, think they are "doing nature good". If they take a step back and look around they will notice that this human-made "nature" which consumes massive amounts of water, to sustain the defined/controlled (human-made) beauty, and think to themselves "oh nature is perfect, oh how well I am protecting it!". I don't know many city-dwellers that actually go for a hike on a real mountain to be in/with nature (and not some 5-star-hotel-private-beach or human-made green path).
- gambiting 10y ago
  Jesus, there's no way to keep people happy, is there? Mega-cities are the most nature-friendly way of living, because they pack most humans over the smallest possible area. I'd love for everyone to live on their little farm with a nice orchard in the back, but that's just not feasible. Also, is strikes me as extremely elitist that you complain about people going on man-made green paths or private beach hotels. Is my appreciation of a forest lower because the path has been gravelled by someone, or my appreciation of a sunset over disappearing horizon not as important, because there's a 5 star hotel behind my back? It's just extremely bigoted to say how someone can enjoy something.
  - HenryBemis 10y ago
    I am far from elitist. I enjoy both camping, and the 5star hotel. Each has its own benefits. I am discussing the people whose idea of "Nature" is a park. Paved/defined paths rule (and keep us safe) and I wish more and more people would go for a hike instead of rotting away in front of a tv watching GoT ;) Sunset: try Aigiali in Amorgos :)
- rimliu 10y ago
  And your point is? There should be no parks? We should not call them nature? We should not throw cans into bins? I grew in a nature. Now I live near a park. The tree is still a tree and I don't leave trash around no matter if I am in the forest or in the park. Actually littering is one of the things I just cannot understand. How a person should be brought up to think that leaving trash scattered behind is in any way normal thing to do.
the-dude 10y ago
Nice result. It feels good too.
spodek 10y ago
Saying playing outside leads to protecting nature implies they take effort from the norm. I prefer to look at playing outdoors and caring about nature as normal, so I'd restate it as "Keeping children indoors too much leads them to harm the environment more as adults." Anyone can define "normal" for themselves how they want. I find this perspective leads to going outside more and caring more about the environment.
- mc32 10y ago
  Does this mean that the most vociferous protectors of the environment may come from farming and rural areas where kids pretty much spend the majority of their free time outdoors? I'm not sure there is a connection, or maybe this speaks only to people who are generally removed from nature and only see it in spurts? In any event, the more conservationist (within reason) the better --just not sure these results mean much.
- rorykoehler 10y ago
  I find this with much in the mainstream media. So much so that I created a browser plugin to change some terms that really irked me (anti-austerity for example).
pm90 10y ago
Anecdotally, it worked for me. My parents did not have the money to purchase even a computer; the TV which we had was limited to 20 channels. So I ended up spending a lot of time outside, playing outdoors, exploring nooks and crannies of our mixed urban neighborhood. What made an immense impact on me was just how polluted with trash/garbage a lot of the city was (Mumbai, India). So there was no need for a teacher to tell me to not litter; I could see what effect cumulative littering had on the environment.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
DoodleBuggy 10y ago
Source study https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/australian-journal-of-environmental-education/article/div-classtitleexploring-the-relations-between-childhood-experiences-in-nature-and-young-adults-environmental-attitudes-and-behavioursdiv/029FC630519229DA5744DBFC257C0EA1 https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/australian-journal-o... I don't find this surprising. If you have a closer connection to something, you tend to value it more.
kleiba 10y ago
My buddies and I used to play outdoors whenever the weather allowed as kids. My mom would literally kick me out if I stayed inside on a nice day. These days, when I walk through the streets of my neighborhood, I don't ever see any kids play outside, even on the sunniest of days. In parts I see that one of the reason for that may be that a lot of the open space we used to have as kids have been built on since. There was an empty lot to both sides of my parents house in my childhood with trees on them that we used to climb all the time, surrounded by a wire mesh fence that was used as our soccer goal. This space is gone, and I wouldn't even know where kids should even play in my parents' street. But then, there's also a playground close to my grandparents' house that was always inhabited by children back in the day. It got renovated a couple of years ago and is arguably much nice today than it was, yet I never see anyone there. Of course, the families that live in that areas had kids at around the same time that my parents did, so it wouldn't be surprising if not a lot of children lived in that area today. Perhaps I will have to wait another generation before younger families move in that area again? But there are parts of the town where I live that are less old and where I know that young families live there. Still, no kids in the street, as far as I can see.
- crooked-v 10y ago
  A bigger factor than lack of open space would probably be things like parents getting accused of neglect for letting their kids be outside by themselves. http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2015/04/13/parents-investigated-letting-children-walk-alone/25700823/ http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2015/04/13/parents...
gitpusher 10y ago
"The correlations between expressed views about caring for the environment and environmentally friendly actions were surprising, however, as actions did not necessarily align with beliefs."
jaequery 10y ago
this more like playing basketball makes you more likely to become a professional basketball player. i mean, cmon.

181 points by devinp 10y ago

tradersam 10y ago

I'm curious to know if there is a correlation between climate change deniers and playing outside as well.

arketyp 10y ago
Would that, so to speak, be a negative correlation? Seeing how today the no-questions-asked progressive dogma of the deepest concrete city dwellers seems to be to accept even the worst painted climate change scenarios.
- crooked-v 10y ago
  For city dwellers, seeing the negative effect of mankind on the environment is as simple as leaving a window open in summer and having to regularly wipe a coating of black dust off the windowsill.
  - arketyp 10y ago
    Yes. I would guess, because of this, city dwellers are more susceptible to the idea of anthropogenic effects, while people in rural areas in contrast are used to witnessing a more resilient character in nature.
    - sudojudo 10y ago
      Rural anecdote from the northwest: The stream I played in as a kid is now polluted by a feed lot. Cattle are everywhere. Invasive weeds are also everywhere. Native insects are dying off, while their replacements decimate forests, one mountain at a time, heading north. The rivers and streams are full of plastic and algal bloom. Finding a tree that's more than fifty years old is neat. There was a giant fish die-off in the rivers last year. Everyone wants a few acres of their own, but they also want water and sewer, in a nice neighborhood, not too far from town. Subdivisions even trump cattle, the only thing that will beat those out is a natural resource that can be exploited. There are a dozen other environmental issues I could extrapolate on, that are happening just outside my back door, and I live in BFE. Good times in rural America, nature is really holding up. This whole city vs. country argument is silly. It's not another species out here; some people care about the environment and some don't, just like anywhere. Will rural populations stay behind the curve on some issues? Of course, but they're still people, like you.
DoodleBuggy 10y ago
There's certainly a high correlation between belief in science and education as well as how much garbage media is consumed.

Razengan 10y ago

I almost never played outside, and I didn't even grow up around "nature" — in garbage-plagued cities, in fact, but maybe that has made me want to protect nature anyway.

HenryBemis 10y ago

There is also a misconception of what "nature" is. Mega-city-dwellers going for a walk to a park and throwing their empty-soda-can in a bin, think they are "doing nature good". If they take a step back and look around they will notice that this human-made "nature" which consumes massive amounts of water, to sustain the defined/controlled (human-made) beauty, and think to themselves "oh nature is perfect, oh how well I am protecting it!". I don't know many city-dwellers that actually go for a hike on a real mountain to be in/with nature (and not some 5-star-hotel-private-beach or human-made green path).

gambiting 10y ago
Jesus, there's no way to keep people happy, is there? Mega-cities are the most nature-friendly way of living, because they pack most humans over the smallest possible area. I'd love for everyone to live on their little farm with a nice orchard in the back, but that's just not feasible. Also, is strikes me as extremely elitist that you complain about people going on man-made green paths or private beach hotels. Is my appreciation of a forest lower because the path has been gravelled by someone, or my appreciation of a sunset over disappearing horizon not as important, because there's a 5 star hotel behind my back? It's just extremely bigoted to say how someone can enjoy something.
- HenryBemis 10y ago
  I am far from elitist. I enjoy both camping, and the 5star hotel. Each has its own benefits. I am discussing the people whose idea of "Nature" is a park. Paved/defined paths rule (and keep us safe) and I wish more and more people would go for a hike instead of rotting away in front of a tv watching GoT ;) Sunset: try Aigiali in Amorgos :)
rimliu 10y ago
And your point is? There should be no parks? We should not call them nature? We should not throw cans into bins? I grew in a nature. Now I live near a park. The tree is still a tree and I don't leave trash around no matter if I am in the forest or in the park. Actually littering is one of the things I just cannot understand. How a person should be brought up to think that leaving trash scattered behind is in any way normal thing to do.

the-dude 10y ago

Nice result. It feels good too.

spodek 10y ago

Saying playing outside leads to protecting nature implies they take effort from the norm. I prefer to look at playing outdoors and caring about nature as normal, so I'd restate it as "Keeping children indoors too much leads them to harm the environment more as adults." Anyone can define "normal" for themselves how they want. I find this perspective leads to going outside more and caring more about the environment.

mc32 10y ago
Does this mean that the most vociferous protectors of the environment may come from farming and rural areas where kids pretty much spend the majority of their free time outdoors? I'm not sure there is a connection, or maybe this speaks only to people who are generally removed from nature and only see it in spurts? In any event, the more conservationist (within reason) the better --just not sure these results mean much.
rorykoehler 10y ago
I find this with much in the mainstream media. So much so that I created a browser plugin to change some terms that really irked me (anti-austerity for example).

pm90 10y ago

Anecdotally, it worked for me. My parents did not have the money to purchase even a computer; the TV which we had was limited to 20 channels. So I ended up spending a lot of time outside, playing outdoors, exploring nooks and crannies of our mixed urban neighborhood. What made an immense impact on me was just how polluted with trash/garbage a lot of the city was (Mumbai, India). So there was no need for a teacher to tell me to not litter; I could see what effect cumulative littering had on the environment.

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

DoodleBuggy 10y ago

Source study https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/australian-journal-of-environmental-education/article/div-classtitleexploring-the-relations-between-childhood-experiences-in-nature-and-young-adults-environmental-attitudes-and-behavioursdiv/029FC630519229DA5744DBFC257C0EA1 https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/australian-journal-o... I don't find this surprising. If you have a closer connection to something, you tend to value it more.

kleiba 10y ago

My buddies and I used to play outdoors whenever the weather allowed as kids. My mom would literally kick me out if I stayed inside on a nice day. These days, when I walk through the streets of my neighborhood, I don't ever see any kids play outside, even on the sunniest of days. In parts I see that one of the reason for that may be that a lot of the open space we used to have as kids have been built on since. There was an empty lot to both sides of my parents house in my childhood with trees on them that we used to climb all the time, surrounded by a wire mesh fence that was used as our soccer goal. This space is gone, and I wouldn't even know where kids should even play in my parents' street. But then, there's also a playground close to my grandparents' house that was always inhabited by children back in the day. It got renovated a couple of years ago and is arguably much nice today than it was, yet I never see anyone there. Of course, the families that live in that areas had kids at around the same time that my parents did, so it wouldn't be surprising if not a lot of children lived in that area today. Perhaps I will have to wait another generation before younger families move in that area again? But there are parts of the town where I live that are less old and where I know that young families live there. Still, no kids in the street, as far as I can see.

crooked-v 10y ago
A bigger factor than lack of open space would probably be things like parents getting accused of neglect for letting their kids be outside by themselves. http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2015/04/13/parents-investigated-letting-children-walk-alone/25700823/ http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2015/04/13/parents...

gitpusher 10y ago

"The correlations between expressed views about caring for the environment and environmentally friendly actions were surprising, however, as actions did not necessarily align with beliefs."

jaequery 10y ago

this more like playing basketball makes you more likely to become a professional basketball player. i mean, cmon.