Parenting styles and the connection with nature: A look into a nature program
Abstract views: 491 / PDF downloads: 232
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.37291/2717638X.202343288Keywords:
Environmental education, Early childhood, Nature relatedness, Nature education programAbstract
Currently, there seems to be a decline in direct experiences of nature, with a consequent decrease in connection with nature, which could unavoidably result in negative consequences, especially in what concerns children. With the goal of narrowing this ever-growing gap, as well as raising awareness for the importance of outdoor spaces/nature as promoters of development and learning, the Invisible Limits Project (IL) was founded. Thus, the present investigation aimed to better understand the enrollment motives, sociodemographic variables, parenting styles and Nature Relatedness (NR) of parents who enrolled their children in IL, as well as to analyze these same variables and identify parent profiles based on NR and frequency of nature contact, while additionally attempting to ascertain the role of contact with nature as a predictor of NR, all in an effort to rethink and improve existing educational offers. The investigation follows a comparative typology, counting 286 total participants, divided into an experimental group (n=135) - comprised of those who enrolled their children in IL - and a control group (n=151), to which the previous criterion did not apply. For the statistical analysis of the collected data, IBM SPSS Statistics v25, jamovi v1.6, JASP 0.16.1.0 and MaxQDA v2020.4 were used. In what pertains to the results, the main reason for parents to enrol their children in an educational experience in nature was the promotion of contact with nature. Additionally, there were no observable differences between groups, regarding both parenting styles and NR. Concomitantly, frequent contact with nature (both during childhood and throughout life) was determined to be a predictor of a higher NR. In view of the results and in view of the current climate changes, as well as life’s sustainability on the planet, further studies are required, in order to better understand one’s connection with nature.
References
Ahmetoglu, E. (2017). The contributions of familial and environmental factors to children’s connection with nature and outdoor activities. Early Child Development and Care, 189(2), 233–243. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/03004430.2017.1314273
Amado, J. (2014). A investigação em educação e os seus paradigmas [Investigation in education and its paradigms]. In J. Amado (Ed.), Manual de investigação qualitativa em educação (pp. 19–70). Imprensa da Universidade de Coimbra. DOI: https://doi.org/10.14195/978-989-26-0879-2
American Psychological Association. (2020, September 27). APA dictionary of psychology. https://dictionary.apa.org/nature
Baumrind, D. (1971). Current patterns of parental authority. Developmental Psychology Monograph, 4(1), 1–103. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1037/h0030372
Baumrind, D., Larzelere, R. E., & Owens, E. B. (2010). Effects of preschool parents' power assertive patterns and practices on adolescent development. Parenting: Science and Practice, 10(3), 157-201. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/15295190903290790
Bentsen, P., Mygind, E., & Randrup, T. (2009). Towards an understand of udeskole: education outside the classroom in a Danish context. Education 3-13: International Journal of Primary, Elementary and Early Years Education, 37(1), 29-44. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/03004270802291780
Capaldi, C. A., Dopko, R. L., & Zelenski, J. M. (2014). The relationship between nature connectedness and happiness: A meta-analysis. Frontiers in Psychology, 5, 976. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00976
Chawla, L. (2015). Benefits of nature contact for children. Journal of Planning Literature, 30(4), 433-452. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0885412215595441
Chawla, L. (2020). Childhood nature connection and constructive hope: A review of research on connecting with nature and coping with environmental loss. People and Nature, 2(3), 619-642. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/pan3.10128
Coelho, A., Vale, V., Bigotte, E., Figueiredo-Ferreira, A., Duque, I., & Pinho, L. (2015). Oferta educativa outdoor como complemento da educação pré-escolar: Os benefícios do contacto com a natureza [Outdoor educational offers as pre-school education complement: the benefits of nature contact]. Revista de Estudios e Investigación en Psicología y Educación, 10, 111-117. DOI: https://doi.org/10.17979/reipe.2015.0.10.585
Costa, M. C. (2021). Programa casa da mata: Perceção do impacto nas competências socioemocionais das crianças em idade pré-escolar [Casa da Mata program: socioemotional competence impact perception in pre-school age children; Master's thesis]. Universidade de Aveiro. https://ria.ua.pt/handle/10773/31548
Figueiredo, A. (2015). Interação Criança-Espaço Exterior Em Jardim De Infância [Child-outdoor space interaction in kindergartens; Doctoral dissertation]. Universidade de Aveiro. https://ria.ua.pt/bitstream/10773/14081/1/interação%20criança-espaço%20exterior%20em%20jardim%20de%20infancia.pdf
Figueiredo, A., Duque, I., Coelho, A., & Bigotte, E. (2021). Projeto limites invisíveis: Uma abordagem educativa na natureza [Limites Invisíveis project: an educational approach in nature]. In A. Oliveira (Ed.), Psicologia e suas interfaces (pp. 88-101). Quipá.
Figueiredo, A., Portugal, G., Sá-Couto, P., & Neto, C. (2013). Early outdoor learning in Portugal. In S. Knight (Ed.), International perspectives on forest school: Natural spaces to play and learn (pp. 61-72). SAGE Publications Ltd. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4135/9781446288665.n6
Ghimire, R., Green, G. T., Poudyal, N. C., & Cordell, H. K. (2014). An analysis of perceived constraints to outdoor recreation. Journal of Park and Recreation Administration, 32(4), 52-67.
Gill, T. (2014). The benefits of children's engagement with nature: A systematic literature review. Children, Youth and Environments, 24(2), 10-34. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1353/cye.2014.0024
Kellert, S. (2002) Experiencing nature: Affective, cognitive and evaluative development in children. In P. Kahn, & S. Kellert (Eds.), Children and nature: Psychological, sociocultural and evolutionary investigations (pp. 117-151). The MIT Press.
Kellert, S., & Calabrese, E. (2015). The practice of biophilic design (1st Ed.). Yale University Press.
Kuo, M, Barnes, M., & Jordan, C. (2019). Do experiences with nature promote learning? Converging evidence of a cause-and-effect relationship. Frontiers in Psychology, 10, 305. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00305
Lee, D. K. (2020). Data transformation: A focus on the interpretation. Korean Journal of Anesthesiology, 73(6), 503–508. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4097/kja.20137
Lima, J. A. (2013). Por uma análise de conteúdo mais fiável [For a more reliable content analysis]. Revista Portuguesa de Pedagogia, 47(1), 7-26. DOI: https://doi.org/10.14195/1647-8614_47-1_1
Marôco, J. (2018). Análise estatística com o SPSS statistics (7th Ed). ReportNumber.
Martin, L., White, M.P., Hunt, A., Richardson, M., Pahl, S., & Burt, J. (2020). Nature contact, nature connectedness and associations with health, wellbeing and pro-environmental behaviours. Journal of Environmental Psychology, 68, 101389. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvp.2020.101389
McFarland, A. L., Zajicek, J. M., & Waliczek, T. M. (2014). The relationship between parental attitudes toward nature and the amount of time children spend in outdoor recreation. Journal of Leisure Research, 46(5), 525–539. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/00222216.2014.11950341
Naeem, S., & Wumaier, A. (2018). Study and implementing K-mean clustering algorithm on English text and techniques to find the optimal value of k. International Journal of Computer Applications, 182(31), 7–14. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5120/ijca2018918234
Nisbet, E. K., Zelenski, J. M., & Murphy, S.A. (2009). The nature relatedness scale. Linking individuals’ connection with nature to environmental concern and behavior. SAGE Publications, 41(5), 715-740. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0013916508318748
Passmore, H., Martin, L., Richardson, M., White, M., Hunt, A., & Pahl, S. (2021). Parental/guardians’ connection to nature better predicts children´s nature connectedness than visits or area-level characteristics. Ecopsychology, 13(2), 103-113. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1089/eco.2020.0033
Pessoa, V. (2011). Análise do conhecimento e atitudes frente às fontes renováveis de energia: uma contribuição para a Psicologia [Knowledge and attitude analysis regarding renewable energy sources: a contribution towards Psychology; Doctoral dissertation]. Universidade Federal da Paraíba. https://repositorio.ufpb.br/jspui/handle/tede/6885
Pires, M., Jesus, S. N. D., & Hipólito, J. (2011). Questionário de estilos parentais para pais (PAQ-P) - Estudos de validação [Parenting styles questionnaire for parents (PAQ-P – validation studies; Paper presentation]. VIII Congresso Iberoamericano de avaliação/evaluación Psicológica–XV Conferência Internacional de Avaliação Psicológica, Lisboa.
Rey, D., Neuhäuser, M. (2011). Wilcoxon-signed-rank test. In M. Lovric (Eds). International encyclopedia of statistical science (pp. 1658–1659. Springer. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-04898-2_616
Schoeppe, S., Duncan, M. J., Badland, H. M., Alley, S., Williams, S., Rebar, A. L., & Vandelanotte, C. (2015). Socio-demographic factors and neighbourhood social cohesion influence adults’ willingness to grant children greater independent mobility: A cross-sectional study. BMC Public Health, 15, 690. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-015-2053-2
Shapiro, S. S., Wilk, M. B., & Chen, H. J. (1968). A comparative study of various tests for normality. Journal of the American Statistical Association, 63(324), 1343–1372. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/01621459.1968.10480932
Silva N., (2019). O brincar na natureza: perceção dos pais sobre os seus efeitos no
desenvolvimento das crianças [Playing in nature: parents’ perception on its effects in children’s development; Master's thesis]. Universidade de Aveiro. https://ria.ua.pt/handle/10773/29473
Skar, M., Wold, L. C., Gundersen, V., & O’Brien, L. (2016). Why do children not play in nearby nature? Results from a Norwegian survey. Journal of Adventure Education and Outdoor Learning, 16(3), 239–255. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/14729679.2016.1140587
Soga, M., & Gaston, K. (2016). Extinction of the experience: The loss of human-nature interactions. Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, 14(2), 94-101. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/fee.1225
Soga, M., Gaston, K., Koyanagi, T., Kurisu, K., & Hanaki, K. (2016). Urban residents' perceptions of neighbourhood nature: Does the extinction of experience matter?. Biological Conservation, 203, 143-150. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2016.09.020
Soga, M., Yamanoi, T., Tsuchiya, K., Koyanagi, T. F., & Kanai, T. (2018). What are the drivers of and barriers to children’s direct experiences of nature?. Landscape and Urban Planning, 180, 114-120. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landurbplan.2018.08.015
Sugiyama, N., Hosaka T., Takagi, E., & Numata, S. (2021). How do childhood nature experiences and negative emotions towards nature influence preferences for outdoor activity among young adults?. Landscape and Urban Planning, 205, 103971. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landurbplan.2020.103971
van de Wetering, J., Leitjen, P., Spitzer, J., & Thomaes, S. (2022). Does environmental education benefit environmental outcomes in children and adolescents? A meta-analysis. Journal of Environmental Psychology, 81, 101782. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvp.2022.101782
Whitburn, J., Linklater, W. and Abrahamse, W. (2020), Meta-analysis of human connection to nature and proenvironmental behavior. Conservation Biology, 34(1), 180-193. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/cobi.13381
Williams-Siegfredsen, J. (2012). Understanding the Danish forest school approach: early years education in practice. Routledge DOI: https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203136034
Wood, C., & Smyth, N. (2019) The health impact of nature exposure and green exercise across the life course: A pilot study. International Journal of Environmental Health, 30(2), 226-235. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/09603123.2019.1593327
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Childhood, Education & Society
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Attribution: You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use.
NonCommercial: You may not use the material for commercial purposes.
NoDerivatives: If you remix, transform, or build upon the material, you may not distribute the modified material.
Author(s) must confirm that the Journal of Childhood, Education & Society retains all the copyrights unconditionally and indefinitely to publish articles.