29
IRUS Total
Downloads
  Altmetric

Awareness, concern and willingness to adopt biosecure behaviours: public perceptions of invasive tree pests and pathogens in the UK

File Description SizeFormat 
Urquhart et al_accepted manuscript.pdfAccepted version464.76 kBAdobe PDFView/Open
10.1007%2Fs10530-017-1467-4.pdfPublished version796.1 kBAdobe PDFView/Open
Title: Awareness, concern and willingness to adopt biosecure behaviours: public perceptions of invasive tree pests and pathogens in the UK
Authors: Urquhart, J
Potter, C
Barnett, J
Fellenor, J
Mumford, J
Quine, CP
Bayliss, H
Item Type: Journal Article
Abstract: The growing incidence of invasive tree pest and disease outbreaks is recognised as a n increasing threat to ecosystem services and human wellbeing. Linked to global trade, human movement and climate change, a number of outbreaks have attracted high public and media attention. However, there is surprisingly little evidence characteris ing the nature of public attentiveness to the se events , nor how publics might respond to evolving outbreaks and the management actions taken. This paper presents findings from an online questionnaire involving 1 , 334 respondents nationally - representative of the Bri tish public to assess awareness , concern and willingness to adopt biosecure behaviours. D espite revealing low levels of awareness and knowledge, the results indicate that the British public is concern ed about the health of trees, forests and woodlands and is moderately willing to adopt biosecure behaviours. A key finding is that membership of environment al organisations and strong place identity are likely to engender higher awareness and levels of concern about tree pests and diseases. Further, those who v isit woodlands regularly are likely to be more aware than non - visitors, and gardeners are more likely to be concerned than non - gardeners. Women, older respondents, those with strong place identity and dependence, members of environmental organisations, woo dland visitors and gardeners were most likely to express a willingness to adopt biosecure behaviours. A comparison with findings from a survey conducted by the authors three years previously show s a decline over time in awareness , concern and willingness.
Issue Date: 19-Jun-2017
Date of Acceptance: 29-May-2017
URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10044/1/46134
DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10530-017-1467-4
ISSN: 1573-1464
Publisher: Springer Verlag (Germany)
Start Page: 2567
End Page: 2582
Journal / Book Title: Biological Invasions
Volume: 19
Issue: 9
Copyright Statement: © The Author(s) 2017 This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.
Sponsor/Funder: Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC)
Funder's Grant Number: BB/L012308/1
Keywords: 05 Environmental Sciences
06 Biological Sciences
Ecology
Publication Status: Published
Appears in Collections:Centre for Environmental Policy
Faculty of Natural Sciences