Urbanization has been linked to the “extinction of experience” (EoE), a decline in direct contact with nature that may weaken long-term support for biodiversity conservation. EoE is often described as an intergenerational feedback process in which reduced nature contact in one generation leads to lower engagement in the next. However, this proposed intergenerational transmission has not been tested empirically. Because urban children might face more barriers to contact nature than rural children, parental influence may play a more critical role in urban contexts. Here, we hypothesized that parents’ childhood NE would be a stronger predictor of children’s NE in urban than rural areas.
To test this hypothesis, we surveyed 594 parent–child pairs (4th–5th graders) in urban and rural Vietnam. Parents reported the frequency of their childhood nature experiences (NE), and children reported that of their current NE across three types: (1) greenspace visits (e.g., farms, waterbodies, parks, and forests), (2) direct NE (e.g., soil play), and (3) vicarious NE (e.g., watching nature on television). Structural equation modeling was used to test whether parents’ childhood NE affect their children’s NE, possibly through parental permission for free play and parental orientation toward nature. Parents’ perceived nature availability was included in the models as a control environmental factor.
Contrary to our expectation, intergenerational transmission of direct NE was observed only in rural areas where parents’ childhood direct NE positively affected children’s direct NE and visits to farms and waterbodies. These relationships were mediated by both parental permission and parental orientation toward nature. In urban areas, parents’ childhood direct NE did not significantly predict children’s direct NE. However, parents’ childhood vicarious NE positively affected children’s vicarious NE in both settings, mediated by parental orientation.
These findings suggest that direct childhood NE of one generation plays an important role in shaping direct NE in the next generation. But this would be the case where natural areas are available to children like in rural Vietnam and well-designed urban areas in developed countries. The absence of feedback loop in urban Vietnam is possibly due to very limited availability of greenspaces (e.g. parks) with sufficient natural elements there. Such urban design is ubiquitous in rapidly and intensively urbanized developing countries, and NE can “extinct” immediately irrespective of parents’ NE and orientation. Therefore, EoE might be occurring more rapidly and seriously in urban areas of developing countries.