How do members of the public and wildlife managers understand living with wildlife versus coexisting with wildlife?

ABSTRACT

‘Coexisting with wildlife’ and ‘living with wildlife’ are commonly used in communication efforts designed to mitigate human-wildlife conflicts. However, there is little information on how the public understands these terms and how their understanding compares to wildlife managers’ intended message. In 2019 we surveyed 1,045 Florida residents and 140 Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) officials to examine their understanding of, and preferences for, the terms ‘coexisting with wildlife’ and ‘living with wildlife.’ We analyzed data using qualitative and quantitative methods. FWC officials were more likely to interpret both terms as people changing their behavior to mitigate human-wildlife conflicts or tolerating conflicts with wildlife, whereas the public tended to focus on reduced nuisance behavior by wildlife. Wildlife managers should clearly define terms to avoid confusion or miscommunication, which may result in the public not altering their behavior or mistakenly taking actions that exacerbate human-wildlife conflicts such as domesticating wildlife.

KEYWORDS:

• Behavior change
• Florida
• human-wildlife conflicts
• qualitative analysis
• quantitative analysis
• tolerance

Acknowledgments

We thank J. Kahler and M. Monroe for their comments on the design of this research and analysis. Funding for this research was provided by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

Disclosure Statement

We have no known conflict of interest to disclose.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission [Contact 13416-A3039, Contract 18263, Contract 13484].