Drivers of mangrove area change and suppression in Brazil from 2000 to 2020.

Mangrove area loss is increasing globally, and drivers of loss differ depending not only on natural conditions but also on national and regional policies. Some countries with the most mangrove area, for instance, Brazil, lack broad systematic quantification of specific drivers of mangrove land-use and land-cover (LULC) change dynamics. We investigated the direct conversion (i.

Fundamental principles of the effect of habitat fragmentation on species with different movement rates.

Habitat loss and fragmentation have independent impacts on biodiversity; thus, field studies are needed to distinguish their impacts. Moreover, species with different locomotion rates respond differently to fragmentation, complicating direct comparisons of the effects of habitat loss and fragmentation across differing taxa and landscapes. To overcome these challenges, we combined mechanistic mathematical modeling and laboratory experiments to compare how species with different locomotion rates were affected by low (∼80% intact) and high (∼30% intact) levels of habitat loss.

Biodiversity conservation, consistency, and Mus musculus.

The house mouse (Mus musculus) is often thought of as a pest species in biological conservation, in agriculture, and in urban areas. As a result, populations are frequently targeted for control and eradication. However, M.

Association between attitudes toward wildlife and patterns of risk of human-wildlife conflict near Giant Panda National Park.

Human-wildlife conflict (HWC) is an escalating humanitarian issue and a conservation concern. In terms of protection and management, areas at high risk of HWC are not necessarily afforded the same resources as areas prioritized for protection. To improve allocation of limited protection resources and HWC mitigation efficiency, we determined management priorities based on HWC risk and people's attitudes toward wildlife around the Giant Panda National Park.

Deciphering the enigma of human-lion coexistence in India.

Asiatic lions (Panthera leo leo) have increased in range and abundance in densely populated India, a rare example of coexistence between humans and large carnivores. We sought to determine the underlying mechanisms of this coexistence and to infer lessons that could help conserve carnivores in multiuse landscapes, globally. Using data collected from 2012 to 2017 from conflict-compensation records, we studied the spatiotemporal trends in human-lion conflict across the lion's range in India.

Engaging youth in biodiversity education through visual narrative.

Engaging youth in early and sustained conservation education has important implications for promoting positive attitudes and behaviors in those who will become the future of conservation and management. Toward this goal, visual narratives (comic books, graphic novels) are an increasingly popular method used by conservation scientists to educate young people due to their approachable use of art and narrative storytelling. However, no studies have directly assessed how visual narratives compare with more traditional forms of conservation education for youth.

Adivasi (Tea Tribe) worldviews of living close to wild Asian elephants in Assam, India.

In Assam state, northeastern India, human-elephant conflict mitigation has included technocentric measures, such as installation of barriers, alternative livelihoods, and afforestation. Such measures treat conflict as a technical problem with linear cause-effect relations and are usually ineffective over the long term because they do not consider how historical conditions have shaped present interactions between humans and elephants. Human-elephant encounters in South Asia, including in Assam, have arisen from colonial and postcolonial land-use policies, ethnic relations, and capital extraction.

Stakeholder perceptions of mangrove ecosystem services across scales of conservation focus.

Conservation faces a chronic shortage of resources, including time, funding, mental capacity, and human capital. Efforts to make the expenditure of these resources more efficient should, therefore, support more equitable and effective conservation prioritization. To achieve this, it is necessary to ensure the integration of the knowledge and perceptions of local stakeholders into larger scale conservation decisions.

Embedding equity and inclusion in universities through motivational theory and community-based conservation approaches.

Despite widespread plans to embed justice, equity, decolonization, indigenization, and inclusion (JEDII) into universities, progress toward deeper, systemic change is slow. Given that many community-based conservation (CBC) scholars have experience creating enduring social change in diverse communities, they have transferable skills that could help embed JEDII in universities. We synthesized the literature from CBC and examined it through the lens of self-determination theory to help identify generalizable approaches to create resilient sociocultural change toward JEDII in universities.

Creating constellations of coexistence through connections between people in human-wildlife conflict areas.

Human-wildlife conflict (HWC) is a critical challenge to human development and well-being and threatens biodiversity conservation. Ideally, HWC mitigation should benefit both wildlife and communities and limit the costs associated with living alongside wildlife. However, place- and context-dependent realizations of conflict are often overlooked in HWC mitigation.

M̓ṇúxvʔit model for centering Indigenous knowledge and governance.

The importance of Indigenous (and local) knowledge and governance systems for addressing social and ecological crises is increasingly recognized. Unfortunately, attempts to incorporate Indigenous knowledge into Western approaches, often without the full leadership, consent, and participation of the peoples holding those knowledges, can cause harm and can constitute extractive activities. However, there remains considerable potential in collaborations bringing together multiple perspectives and knowledges.

Using positionality and reflexivity to support equity in partnership-driven research.

Social and economic position and power shape everyone, including scientists and researchers. The way researchers do conservation science and the voices centered in the process are a result of researcher upbringing, experiences, access to resources, and values and are a manifestation of positionality. Positionality is a concept that can help one think about one's position and power in one's work.

Shifting paradigms and creating space for Indigenous leadership in biosecurity management and decision-making.

In New Zealand, awareness regarding protection, enhancement, and regeneration of landscapes and biodiversity is growing as the relationship between functioning and diverse ecosystems and society's health is acknowledged. This relationship is especially important for Indigenous people, who hold strong genealogical and familial ties with nature. Significant biodiversity loss from anthropogenic factors is exacerbated by climate change, ecosystem degradation, and invasive species.

Enhancing disciplinary diversity and inclusion in conservation science and practice based on a case study of the Society for Conservation Biology.

Effective conservation requires a variety of perspectives that center on different ways of knowing. Disciplinary diversity and inclusion (DDI) offers an important means of integrating different ways of knowing into pressing conservation challenges. However, DDI means more than multiple disciplinary approaches to conservation; cognitive diversity and epistemic justice are key.

Cultural ecosystem services and the conservation challenges for an Indigenous people's aquatic protected area practice.

Globally, protected areas associated with sacred sites and cemeteries are an emerging area of research. However, they are biased toward terrestrial systems. In Fiji, funerary protected areas (FPAs) in freshwater and marine systems are culturally protected by Indigenous Fijians following the burial of a loved one on clan land.

Perspectives on inclusion, safety, and belonging from members of the North American LGBTQIA+ conservation community.

Conservation scientists work in diverse settings, sometimes requiring them to exist in spaces where they do not feel safe, included, or accepted. This is often the case for the LGBTQIA+ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning, intersex, asexual, and others) community, which is frequently marginalized in conservation spaces. We conducted an anonymous, semistructured, online survey of members and nonmembers of the LGBTQIA+ community of conservation students and professionals in North America to explore participants' lived experiences in conservation.

Youth engagement in global conservation governance.

Youth are increasingly recognized for their important role in shaping environmental decisions surrounding conservation. Regrettably, youth who are crucial decision-makers are often excluded from environmental governance spaces due to structural barriers, both economic and political. As highlighted by recent environmental justice literature, this marginalization hinders their active participation in the decision-making process.

A framework for promoting disciplinary diversity and inclusion through epistemic justice.

Integrating diverse disciplines and knowledge practices into conservation offers new insights into the complex socioecological dynamics of conservation challenges and how to address them. Integration, however, is not simple; disciplines differ widely in their epistemic and professional commitments, theories, methods, applications, practices, and codes of ethics. Using an epistemic justice approach, we examined how and why different forms of disciplinary and social diversity are connected and offer a framework for promoting disciplinary diversity for conservation science and practice.

Community perceptions of invasive species and environmental management in a US island territory.

Environmental managers struggle with communicating accurate and relevant information and with gaining trust from the communities they serve, problems that are especially pronounced in minority and colonized communities. An important step in developing successful management strategies is partnering directly with the communities involved, but community perceptions are rarely surveyed thoroughly when developing these strategies. We held discussions with 73 people across 22 small groups about their perceptions of environmental issues, with a focus on invasive species, on the island of Guåhan (Guam), a US island territory with a long and continued history of colonization by Western countries.