Explaining Emotional Attachment to a Protected Area by Visitors' Perceived Importance of Seeing Wildlife, Behavioral Connections with Nature, and Sociodemographics

Abstract

Interest in understanding emotional bonds with protected areas has been growing. However, attention has hardly been focused on the role of wildlife in emotional bonding. Our research first explored the relationship between the perceived importance of seeing wildlife and emotional attachment to a protected area, the Dutch Wadden Sea Area. Second, we investigated to what extent this relationship was driven by behavioral connections with nature, and sociodemographics. Results of our survey (n = 211) revealed that the perceived importance of seeing birds contributed directly to emotional attachment. The perceived importance of seeing seals and small marine wildlife contributed indirectly, via behavioral connections with nature. In addition, our results showed that behavioral connections with nature affected emotional attachment more than the perceived importance of seeing wildlife and respondents' sociodemographics. Consequences for natural resource managers are discussed.

Keywords:

• place attachment
• natural environment
• animals
• outdoor recreation

Acknowledgments

We thank management, employees, and guides at the Nature Information Centre Ecomare of Texel, the Nature Centre of Ameland, Water Events Lauwersoog, Nature Centre ‘t Kuitje’ in Den Helder, and the Dutch Wadden Union for their cooperation. We are also grateful to Stenden's International Tourism Management students who assisted in operational activities. In addition, we thank the Research Group Marine Wetland Studies of Stenden University Leeuwarden for their support, and respondents for completing our questionnaire. Finally, we thank the reviewers for their useful comments.