Wild ways: a scoping review to understand urban-rewilding behaviour in relation to adaptations to private gardens

ABSTRACT

Urbanisation is increasing, while global biodiversity is decreasing. Through ‘urban rewilding’ cities could help tackle this biodiversity crisis, while exploiting the benefits of urban nature for residents. Private residential gardens, which have potential to support significant biodiversity, should be a primary focus. Yet their proportion of vegetated space is decreasing through changes made by residents, negatively impacting biodiversity. Small adaptations to private gardens can turn them into wildlife habitat, but understanding residents’ behaviour is critical to developing intervention strategies for this. This paper presents a scoping review of existing literature on understanding intent-orientated, pro-environmental behaviours with a focus on rewilding in urban gardens. The literature is mapped to assess the state of knowledge; it is then coded, using the ‘COM-B’ model of behaviour, to identify the capability, opportunity and motivation factors forming barriers and facilitators to residents engaging in rewilding activity in their gardens. The results show that all COM-B factors need to be considered to understand urban rewilding behaviour, but that opportunity and motivation factors have more influence, particularly reflective motivation. They indicate that facilitators are more significant than barriers and highlight an important body of work that has implications for practice and policy aimed at influencing urban rewilding.

KEYWORDS:

• Behaviour change
• biodiversity
• COM-B
• urban rewilding
• urbanisation
• wildlife gardening

This article is related to:

Research for city practice

Author contributions

SM and JW were co-investigators and wrote the final manuscript, with SM as lead author. JW designed the study. JW and AS conducted the searches. SM, JW and AS conducted the screening. SM, AS, JW and MS conducted the coding. SM and JW conducted the analysis. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Geolocation information

This scoping review includes literature from across the world but aims to support the development of intervention strategies specifically in London, UK.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by London Metropolitan University under its Rescaling Fund and Kusuma Trust under its Community and Environment grant. Subsequent stages of the study will be supported by Kusuma Trust under its Community and Environment grant.

Notes on contributors

Siân Moxon

Siân Moxon is a senior lecturer in sustainable design at London Metropolitan University’s School of Art, Architecture and Design. Siân’s practice-led design research explores urban biodiversity within the Cities group at the Centre for Urban and Built Ecologies (CUBE). Siân leads the ‘environment challenge’ for London Met Lab and the Art, Architecture and Design Education Declares working group. Siân is an architect, author and founder of the award-winning Rewild My Street urban-rewilding campaign.

Justin Webb

Justin Webb is an Associate Professor of Public Health at London Metropolitan University. Justin has been working in the field of public health for over 15 years both as a practitioner and as a researcher. Justin’s former roles include working as the Director of the Centre for Workplace and Community Health at St Mary’s University and as a National Engagement Manager for Macmillan Cancer Support, leading on the charity’s healthy lifestyles programme. Justin’s research interest is in understanding and changing behaviour to improve health.

Alexandros Semertzi

Alexandros Semertzi is an Associate Lecturer in Psychology and Public Health at London Metropolitan University. Alexandros has been working as a Research Assistant since 2021 for 3 projects related to Public Health at London Metropolitan University. He is currently in his final year completing his PhD in Cognitive Neuroscience. Alexandros’s research interest is in attention, memory, and neuroscience of behaviour change for health improvement.

Mina Samangooei

Mina Samangooei is a practicing architect and academic, with research focusing on the role that food production in and on buildings plays for the future of cities. Mina’s PhD looked at behaviour theory in relation to people cultivating edible plants on buildings, which has been brought into practice through workshops and other live projects. Mina is a Senior Lecturer in Architecture and Technology at Oxford Brookes University, leading undergraduate and postgraduate modules and conducting research with collaborators.