Qualitative methods for ecologists and conservation scientists

Abstract

Abstract1. Conservation of biodiversity involves dealing with problems caused by humans, by applying solutions that comprise actions by humans. Understanding human attitudes, knowledge and behaviour are thus central to conservation research and practice.2. The special feature brings together authors from a range of disciplines (ecology, human geography, political science, land economy, management) to examine a set of qualitative techniques used in conservation research: Interviews, Focus group discussion, The Nominal Group Technique and multi-criteria decision analysis.3. These techniques can be used for a range of purposes-most notably to understand people's perspectives, values and attitudes and to gather information about approaches to management of species, ecosystems or natural resources. Incorporating human values, perceptions, judgements and knowledge into conser-vation decision making is an important role for qualitative techniques; they provide robust means for submitting this information or knowledge as evidence.5. The articles in this special feature highlight a worrying extent of poor justification and inadequate reporting of qualitative methods in the conservation literature.6. To improve and encourage greater use of these techniques in conservation science, we urge improved reporting of rationales and methods, along with innovation, adaptation and further testing of the methods themselves.

Interpersonal competencies define effective conservation leadership

“…Such carefully targeted recruitment will better ensure conservation biologists are not training future conservation professionals in disciplines in which they are not formally qualified and have little experience. This will more effectively avoid the poor interdisciplinary research practices currently so prevalent in conservation (Jacobson & McDuff 1998;Raymond & Knight 2013;Sutherland et al 2018).…”

Building a tool to overcome barriers in research-implementation spaces: The Conservation Evidence database

“…Anonymized scores and comments are shared within the expert panel between rounds of scoring, to be used as a basis for refining scores. After 2-3 rounds, final median scores are used to assign an overall effectiveness category for each intervention (Sutherland et al, 2018a(Sutherland et al, , 2018b; Table A1 in Appendix).…”

“…An annual publication, What Works in Conservation (e.g. Sutherland et al, 2018aSutherland et al, , 2018b, presents the key messages and expert assessment for interventions reviewed so far, as a rapid overview and gateway into the online database (via hyperlinks).…”

“…A key feature of the Conservation Evidence database is its breadth, synthesizing evidence for a large number of questions (interventions). Since the first Conservation Evidence synthesis began in 2010, we have reviewed over 1800 interventions (Sutherland et al, 2018a(Sutherland et al, , 2018b for 15 subjects. The aim is to synthesize the evidence for the effects of all interventions, for all taxa and all habitats, everywhere in the world.…”

“…Conservation decisions are not made based on scientific evidence alone; socially acceptable decisions must balance the needs of nature and people. In particular, the quantitative data from the Conservation Evidence database will need to be combined with qualitative data, for example derived from interviews or focus groups, to capture relevant tacit knowledge and values and ultimately design effective conservation strategies (Roux et al, 2006;Sutherland et al, 2018aSutherland et al, , 2018b.…”