Table 2.

Components of Ecological Systems Theory as They Relate to Nature-Seeking Behavior

CONCEPT		COMPONENTS	DEFINITION (+ EXAMPLE)	IMPLICATION FOR NATURE SEEKING
Individual		Self Perception of self	Active agent of influence on the environment Ex. Ability and comfort felt in nature	Degree of agency in and toward nature affected by broader ecosystem
Individual's ecosystem	Microsystem	Home, immediate family, school/work environment, peers, neighborhood, etc.	Defined by three “engines of development”: interaction with persons, objects, and symbols Ex. Family has weekly picnics outdoors	Most influential and proximate level of ecosystem; developmental transference vis-vis nature
	Mesosystem	Inter-relates home, schools, neighborhood, work, etc.	Sphere that connects elements of exosystem to microsystem Ex. Parent's workload precludes time outdoors yet finds no organizational support	Interdependence of microsystems provides fluid context of opportunities and (non-) support for nature seeking
	Exosystem	Mass media, community services, school or workplace, culture, membership organizations	Other formal systems that do not explicitly contain nature-seeking individuals but have indirect influence Ex. Quality of urban parks and transit to access them dis/favors engagement	Potential nature seeker relies on group, messaging, and infrastructure networks to activate behavior
	Macrosystem	Shared cultural values, beliefs, customs, and laws, socio-economic status, ethnicities, location	Already-established culture and society the nature seeker is in Ex. Nature seeker feels welcome vs. dismissed outdoors	Reception by wider society in nature spaces will dictate if nature seeker feels safe or atrisk outdoors
	Chronosystem	Environmental events Life transitions Historical events	Environmental changes occurring over lifetime that influence development Ex. Weakened place attachment with time	Transitions may enable or disenable individual from pursuit of nature seeking
Ecological transition		Developing person, ecological environment	When person's position in ecological environment is altered in response to changes in role, setting, or in characteristics of developing person Ex. Successful navigation in wild	Confronting phobias with success (snakes, darkness, disorientation)
Reciprocal activity		Participation of the developing person, Significant individual who facilitates learning and development	Developing person participates in progressively more complex patterns of reciprocal activity with person of trust and enduring attachment Ex. More novice partner plans and leads outdoor route	Shifts balance of power in favor of developing person
Transforming experiment		Social status, social structures Individual, group, development process	Systematic alteration and/or restructuring of existing ecological systems to challenge belief systems, forms of social organization, and lifestyles of given (sub)culture Ex. More inclusive leadership of conservation organizations	Opposes extant systems or creates new structures
Proximal processes		Evolving human, plus Persons, objects, symbols	Interaction between an actively evolving human and the persons, objects, and symbols of immediate environment Ex. Females alone in woodlands	Effect reduced if environment in which processes occur is unstable
Timing of biological and social transitions		Culturally defined age Role expectations Opportunities Passage of time	Relates to the culturally defined age, role expectations, and opportunities across one's life course Ex. Taking your kids into nature	Influences the course and outcome of development of those closest to you