Protecting wildlife and their habitats is important for human well-being. However, protecting wildlife and their habitats while simultaneously meeting the resource needs of a growing human population is a major sustainability challenge. Addressing this challenge necessitates a holistic understanding of how people, wildlife, and ecosystems are inter-connected. Inherently integrative in nature, a coupled human and natural systems (CHANS) approach brings together theories and analytical techniques from diverse disciplines, including those from ecological and social sciences, to understand the interrelationships between humans and nature. I used a CHANS approach in my dissertation research to study the interactions between a subsistence-based agricultural community and the globally endangered tiger (Panthera tigris) in and around Nepal's Chitwan National Park, a global biodiversity hotspot. I chose tigers in Chitwan because the challenges facing tiger conservation there (e.g., habitat degradation, human-tiger conflict) epitomize the challenges facing wildlife conservation in many regions around the world. Thus insights and lessons learned from this research can be useful for many other regions around the world (e.g., Pantanal in South America). My research had three interrelated objectives: 1) evaluate and map human attitudes toward tigers, 2) evaluate how land management practices and policies impact tiger habitat, and 3) assess how tigers respond to human activities in space and time. To achieve these objectives, I collaborated with U.S. and Nepali institutions performing long-term sociological and environmental studies in the region and used remotely-sensed data, individual surveys, ecological field data, and agent-based modeling and simulation. Research findings revealed new and valuable insights about how local people value tigers, how human activities and policies impact tiger habitat across space and through time, and how tigers use the landscape with respect to humans. For instance, using a novel psychological framework, I found that dissatisfaction with government management of tiger-related risks (i.e., attacks on livestock and people) and the sense of vulnerability to those risks strongly influenced local capacity to live with tigers (Chapter 2). I also found that one's position in society (i.e., educational level, ethnicity, and gender) shaped attitudes toward tigers more so that direct experiences with tigers (e.g., attacks on livestock) (Chapter 3). Furthermore, land-management practices recently implemented (late 1990's and early 2000's) in the multiple-use forest outside the National Park, including community-based resource management and the prohibition of livestock grazing, has restored previously degraded tiger habitat (Chapter 4). Using data from motion-sensing field cameras, I found relatively high tiger densities despite ubiquitous human presence (i.e., people on foot and vehicles), due in part to tigers offsetting their temporal activity patterns to be much less active during the day when human activity peaked (Chapter 5). Also, results from an agent-based model indicated that tigers may spend considerably less time feeding on prey in the presence of people than in the absence of people (Chapter 6). In addition to filling several knowledge gaps that promote the long-term coexistence between people and tigers, my dissertation highlights new substantive research directions that will advance science and on-the-ground conservation efforts. Integrative and interdisciplinary CHANS research, characterized by this dissertation, is an effective approach to addressing some of the most pressing wildlife conservation challenges in a world increasingly crowded by people.
Read
