Perception of interconnectedness: a new typology and tools across disciplines

Increased awareness of human-nature interconnectedness could, according to recent global syntheses, transform the dominant unsustainable systems that threaten our shared future on this planet. We collected and synthesized evidence from the interdisciplinary body of literature on how humans perceive their interconnectedness using a systematic search and thematic coding. Our findings provide three practical additions to the literature and the science-policy interface. First, our typology of six types of interconnectedness lends structure to the interconnectedness concept. It provides an intelligible, operationalizable core of a definition that can serve as goal and guide for efforts to increase interconnectedness. Second, the wide-ranging list of benefits and associations we found can aid practitioners and researchers to understand how diverse the benefits of interconnectedness can be; this may help to broaden coalitions and build support behind the recommended practices of working to increase perceptions of interconnectedness. Finally, our Perception of Interconnectedness Toolkit compiles diverse methods that researchers have used to measure perception of interconnectedness; it provides a menu of options for researchers to adapt to their research goals and contexts. This selection of repeatable methods can help practitioners and researchers to monitor and understand current perceptions of interconnectedness, and whether and how actions (e.g., interventions) may change those perceptions.

The online version contains supplementary material available at https://doi.org/10.1007/s11625-026-01849-1.