Description
Title: The benefits of birdsong for visitors’ experience of nature and wellbeing in vineyards.Abstract: The Anthropocene is characterised by pervasive biodiversity declines, with agriculture being a key driver. These declines, together with growing urbanisation and changing lifestyles, are fuelling human disconnect from nature, which has been linked to poorer physical and mental wellbeing. Sounds like traffic, wind or birdsong are all around us and collectively they form ‘soundscapes’, which play an important role in our experience of nature. Advances in passive acoustic monitoring have permitted us to study soundscapes over time and space. Consequently, we know that biodiversity loss is reflected in soundscapes becoming simpler and quieter. Birdsong is an important feature of soundscapes, and it is expected that changes in bird communities would be mirrored in soundscapes, which in turn could alter our experience of nature. To better understand these relationships, we studied bird communities and soundscapes in English vineyards, a rapidly expanding agricultural industry. Viticulture is heavily embedded in tourism, through tours, and we used this as an opportunity to study the effects of soundscapes on visitors’ experience, including psychological restoration, perception of sounds and connectedness to nature. Through experimental soundscape enhancement, we simulated what soundscapes could sound like following conservation efforts to increase avian diversity. Overall, soundscapes had a positive effect of visitors’ tour experience and nature connectedness. Sound volume and complexity significantly improved visitors’ experience of nature and helped them feel more mindful. These findings present how conservation actions could be optimised in agri-ecotourism settings to benefit bird communities, create accessible opportunities for nature engagement and enhance human wellbeing.
| Period | 25 Feb 2025 |
|---|---|
| Visiting from | University of Kent (United Kingdom) |
| Visitor degree | PhD |