The challenge of biased evidence in conservation
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Abstract
Efforts to tackle the current biodiversity crisis need to be as efficient and effective as possible given chronic underfunding. To inform decision-makers of the most effective conservation actions, it is important to identify biases and gaps in the conservation literature to prioritize future evidence generation. We used the Conservation Evidence database to assess the state of the global literature that tests conservation actions for amphibians and birds. For the studies in the database, we investigated their spatial and taxonomic extent and distribution across biomes, effectiveness metrics, and study designs. Studies were heavily concentrated in Western Europe and North America for birds and particularly for amphibians, and temperate forest and grassland biomes were highly represented relative to their percentage of land coverage. Studies that used the most reliable study designs-before-after control-impact and randomized controlled trials-were the most geographically restricted and scarce in the evidence base. There were negative spatial relationships between the numbers of studies and the numbers of threatened and data-deficient species worldwide. Taxonomic biases and gaps were apparent for amphibians and birds-some entire orders were absent from the evidence base-whereas others were poorly represented relative to the proportion of threatened species they contained. Metrics used to evaluate effectiveness of conservation actions were often inconsistent between studies, potentially making them less directly comparable and evidence synthesis more difficult. Testing conservation actions on threatened species outside Western Europe, North America, and Australasia should be prioritized. Standardizing metrics and improving the rigor of study designs used to test conservation actions would also improve the quality of the evidence base for synthesis and decision-making.
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“This would introduce a raft of new issues, for instance 'black box' opacity of decision processes (Rudin and Radin, 2019) or inappropriate generalizations of incomplete data (Martin et al., 2012; Christie et al., 2020).”
From A Fate Worse Than Warming? Stratospheric Aerosol Injection and Global Catastrophic Risk (2021) · cites this paper as Christie et al., 2020
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Self-citation
- Authors
- Christie, A. P., Amano, T., Martin, P. A., Petrovan, S. O., Shackelford, G. E., Simmons, B. I., Smith, R. K., Williams, D. R., Wordley, C. F. R., & Sutherland, W. J.
- Affiliations
- University of Cambridge (GB)
- The University of Queensland (AU)
- University of Exeter (GB)
- University of Leeds (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Christie, Alec P.
- ORCID
- Venue
- Conservation Biology
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2020-09-05
- Volume
- 35
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 249-262
- ISSN
- 0888-8892 (ISSN-L)
- 1523-1739
- OpenAlex
- W3023716200
- Cited by
- 202
- References
- 50
- Citations by year
- 2026: 28 · 2025: 32 · 2024: 35 · 2023: 27 · 2022: 49 · 2021: 25 · 2020: 6
- FWCI
- 31.60
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Conservation Biology (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory) (acceptedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- White Rose Research Online (University of Leeds, The University of Sheffield, University of York) (acceptedVersion)
- Open Research Exeter (University of Exeter) (acceptedVersion, cc-by)
- Figshare (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Spiral (Imperial College London) (submittedVersion)
- Apollo (University of Cambridge) (submittedVersion)
- Apollo
- Funders
- Arcadia Fund
- Grantham Foundation for the Protection of the Environment
- Natural Environment Research Council (NE, /L002507/1, NE/S001, 395/1)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Management, Monitoring, Policy and Law › Conservation, Ecology, Wildlife Education
- Social Sciences › Decision Sciences › Statistics, Probability and Uncertainty › Meta-analysis and systematic reviews
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Nature and Landscape Conservation › Ecology and Vegetation Dynamics Studies
- Keywords
- amphibians, birds, spatial bias, taxonomic bias, threatened species, data deficient species, effectiveness indicators, research design, randomized controlled trials, evidence synthesis, biodiversity crisis, conservation prioritization
- MeSH terms
- Animals, Conservation of Natural Resources, Europe, North America, Australasia, Biodiversity, Endangered Species
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