All species within an ecosystem depend on one another for survival. People and wildlife have coexisted for more than a millennia. Sometimes this coexistence results in undesirable consequences such as crop destruction and threat to the wellbeing of both humans and animals. The likelihood of such drastic repercussions is becoming rampant, widespread, and a global concern for conservation and development alike. Hence, these hindering interactions between humans and wildlife that lead to negative outcomes for either wildlife or people are called ‘Human-Wildlife Conflicts.’
These conflicts have been studied at a sociocultural level by exploring cultural practices, land use planning policies, and issues between groups collectively using the resources. They have also been studied at an individual level as human-wildlife interactions are inherently uncertain events, relying on the behavioral response of both humans and wildlife.
Conservation psychology strives to study and identify various contexts (such as the number of people present, the proximity of the wild animals’ offspring to the hunter, or a food source) in which an animal’s response is influenced by human presence. Psychological phenomena such as ‘habituation’ and ‘food conditioning’ (explained below) of wildlife are important causes of human-wildlife conflict.The process by which an animal associates humans or human spaces with food is referred to as ‘food conditioning,’ and typically involves either operant or classical conditioning mechanisms. An example of habituation is an animal’s absence of fear response to the presence of humans due to frequently repeated, nonconsequential encounters. This results in the habituated wildlife using human spaces with regularity and foraging within a close range of people. The habituation process is reciprocal; humans may also habituate to the appearance or activities of wildlife.
How does psychology play a role in the interactions with the wild?
Human decision-making occupies a quintessential role in the aforementioned processes. Various factors play an active part in human decision-making such as satisfaction and utility, value orientations, wildlife acceptance capacity, attitudes, norms, perceived risks, and emotions. Attitudes relating to wildlife are one of the most frequently employed concepts for understanding wildlife and conservation-related behaviors. Attitudes refer to our overall evaluations of people, groups, and objects in our social world. For example, the overall perception of large and visible species such as elephants may generate disproportionate concern even if species such as rodents or invertebrates cause more damage. Thus, human thoughts are essential in the understanding of human-wildlife conflicts.
Cognitive theories like the theory of reasoned actions (TRA) and the theory of planned behavior (TPB) favor rational approaches and focus on factors such as perceived effectiveness, tolerance, and perceived behavior control. In essence, it assumes that human beings make rational and well-thought decisions. For example, hunting as a result of self-defense or economic constraints as well as population growth leading to competition for land use and natural resources. Here, the changes made to wildlife are calculated, planned, and then executed.
Many factors other than rational necessity also explain human-wildlife conflicts. This includes the unconscious use of heuristics and biases. Factors such as the mental availability of information and the way ideas are presented largely influence the cognitive appraisal processes. Many people may have preconceived ideas about wildlife based on their upbringing, cultural influences, or prior experience; this actively influences their decision-making and behavior.
Further, emotionally loaded thoughts are highly salient and more readily encoded than non-emotional thoughts. Hence, they are more likely to be accessible when people encounter wildlife. Thus negative encounters with wildlife such as loss of property, crops, livestock, and human lives can lead to a decreased tolerance for wildlife and may result in retaliatory killings. If a person has had a prior human-wildlife interaction that is highly emotionally valenced, then that experience is likely to function as a background variable that influences their behavior and beliefs. If, however, the next time a person encounters the animal and observes new behavior, the consequent emotional state will likely override prior beliefs and influence the individual’s behavioral response as an environmental constraint. Thus, the various dimensions of human cognition and emotion influence conservation-related behaviors directly and indirectly.
Similarly, the framing of wildlife communication materials also largely affects whether people perceive certain interactions as conflict. For example, a park sign that indicates 7% of campers have faced trouble with bears in a campground versus one that reports 92% of campers do not have problems with bears will make a person more likely to evaluate an encounter with a bear as indicative of problems. When such nuances are well understood and human behavior theories are employed at policy levels, the communication and interpretation can be curated to be sensitive to the needs of wildlife, ensuring sustainable implementation of the expected outcomes.
This typically does not occur at random as patterns of conflict can be difficult to identify because of the complexity inherent in wildlife behavior; human behavior; changes in seasonality, cropping, and husbandry behavior; and resource availability. The majority of the current strategies and solutions aren’t optimal and holistic, with the focus being on local prevention and protection from wildlife alone. Management strategies and policies that strive to reassess the relationships between wildlife, humans, culture, and behaviors are more likely to develop sustainable outcomes. Surveys and research at the grass-root level on the locals residing in proximity with the wildlife are required for the identification of various psychological constructs such as attitude, persuasion, biases, values, emotions. Understanding the risk perception of the frontline workers engaged with wildlife management can also help understand the impact of people’s behavior and decision-making on human-wildlife conflicts. Further, affirmative actions can aid in developing a positive attitude. For example, media, as a tool, can be used to change faulty risk perceptions about local wildlife. Similarly, factoring for emotional, cognitive, and other behavioral constructs of the frontline forest staff, guards, and management can help adequately in wildlife conservation.
Human-wildlife conflict has far-reaching effects beyond the wildlife and communities immediately affected by it. The increasing instances have driven the decline of once-abundant species and are continually pushing others to the brink of extinction. In its essence, it is as much of a developmental and humanitarian issue as it is a conservation concern given that it impacts the income, livelihood, and properties of farmers and fishers — particularly those below the poverty line. Thus, understanding the conflict from a sociocultural perspective and the implementation of policy changes are important for a sustainable environment.
Jasleen Kaur
