Print PageThe majority of the world’s population now live in towns and cities, and urban areas are expanding fast than any other land-use. This has potentially profound consequences for both biodiversity conservation, and human health and well-being. Indeed, for many people, urban greenspaces are the only location where they regularly encounter any form of biodiversity, which is of concern as there is increasing evidence that human well-being can be enhanced by exposure to nature. Although there is now a good understanding about how the physical characteristics of cities influence biodiversity, the specific qualities of urban greenspaces that offer the greatest benefits to humans remain poorly understood. Using riparian areas of the city of Sheffield, UK, as a study system, we carry out surveys of bird species richness and abundance and use in situ questionnaires to assess the self-reported psychological well-being gains of human recreational users across a wide array of sites that differ in terms of greenspace structure, habitat type and biodiversity.
Results/Conclusions
We demonstrate that human psychological well-being increases with the number of avian species found on a site, but that the relationship with other metrics of avian biodiversity is less clear. Psychological well-being increases with higher levels of tree cover, but is unrelated to habitat diversity. In contrast, both environmental characteristics (tree cover and habitat diversity) lead to higher avian species richness. Our findings suggest that managing urban greenspaces to increase tree cover will result in a win-win scenario, enhancing bird diversity as well as improving the psychological well-being of human recreational visitors. The self-reported well-being gain that people derive from the presence of more bird species may, in part, be determined by their ability to recognise common elements of the urban avifauna and therefore perceive how many species are present. However, such identification skills are commonly poor in the developed world. Over a quarter of visitors were unable to identify accurately any pictures of a selection species found in the study areas, although we do establish that those with better identification skills perceived levels of biodiversity more accurately.
