In a study published in Conservation Letters, researchers from the Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden (XTBG) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences demonstrated that place-based education significantly enhances pro-nature conservation behavior in adolescents. They showed that a strong sense of place (the emotional and cognitive bond with a location) gives them the confidence to act for conservation, driving them to take actual steps to conserve nature.

Using Bryde’s whale conservation in China’s Weizhou Island as a case study, the researchers designed a three-month educational intervention program involving 110 adolescents. Besides lectures, they provided the curriculum combined participatory activities and advocacy initiatives, encouraging adolescents to apply what they had learned to real conservation efforts.

The researchers found that the program increased both the participants' confidence in their ability to act and their engagement in conservation behaviors such as sharing knowledge, initiating nature observations, and intervening to prevent environmental damage.

Notably, they found that the participants' conservation agency (one’s belief in their ability to make a difference) and behaviors continued to improve even after the intervention, particularly among adolescents involved in volunteer advocacy. Qualitative interviews showed a clear shift from expressing concern to actively proposing and implementing solutions.

The structural equation modeling confirmed the pathway: a strengthened emotional and cognitive connection to a location (sense of place) directly increased agency, which was the key driver of conservation behavior. This model explained 65.8% of the variance in agency and 30.7% in behavior.

Moreover, the researchers found that subjective norms and peer culture played crucial roles in developing the adolescents' conservation agency.

“Our findings indicate that well-designed, place-based learning can effectively close the gap between wanting to help the environment and actually taking action. By focusing on this kind of hands-on, experience-driven education, we can empower young people to become active guardians of biodiversity,” said CHEN Jin from XTBG, the corresponding author of the study.