Animal ambassador interpretation techniques and its impact on connectedness to nature

Abstract

This exploratory study examined the effects of naming animal ambassadors on participants’ level of Empathy, Altruism, Connectedness to Nature, and Commitment to Engaging in Environmentally responsible Behaviors. Raptor educational presentations were used for this study. Two animal ambassadors were used in the experiment (one animal was given its common species name versus the other was named after its natural history). Observations, online questionnaires, and telephone interviews were used to assess the effects of implementing different named animal ambassadors in programing. Findings indicated no statistical significance between control and treatment groups, but found qualitative evidence signaling the effectiveness of naming animal ambassadors.

Acknowledgments

This work is supported by Hatch project no. GEO00848/project accession no. 1011810 from the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture. We are grateful to Dr. Lucy McClain, Jason Beale, and Shaver’s Creek Environmental Center at the Pennsylvania State University. We thank the anonymous reviewers for a helpful review. This study is product of the Newberry Laboratory of Animal Ambassadors. Research protocol was approved by University of Georgia IRB STUDY00004949 and Pennsylvania State University IRB STUDY00007227.