Cecily Jane Maller

• PhD
• Professor at RMIT University

Pathways to sustainability require a broader and fuller representation of the multiple values of nature in policy and practice. In this People and Nature special feature entitled ‘The Multiple Values of Nature’, researchers interpreted all three key words differently: multiple, values and nature. The articles also engaged variously with concepts, t...

Considering that many fresh food items require domestic cold storage, understanding the role of appliances such as freezers is critical to reducing greenhouse gas emissions relating to domestic food waste and energy use. Using a social practices approach, this article reports on a study of cold storage and food waste practices, particularly freezin...

The cleanliness, mobility and quality of urban air has regained political legibility in debates on post-pandemic cities. To contextualize the political and epistemological significance of air in urban contexts, we suggest looking at the under-researched experience of premodern cities and bodies, how they developed a complex ecological imagination a...

In 2020, Covid-19 led to global policy statements promoting bans and reforms to wet markets in Asia and Africa to prevent future pandemics. We conducted a comparative, exploratory qualitative study in 2021 in three countries (Kenya, Vietnam and the Philippines) to understand the social and political dimensions to biosecurity reform at wet markets....

Urban biodiversity conservation is critical if cities are to tackle the biodiversity‐extinction crisis and connect people with nature. However, little attention has been paid to how urban environmental managers navigate complex socio‐ecological contexts to conserve biodiversity in cities. We interviewed environmental managers from Australian cities...

Microbes, particularly of the viral kind, are currently preoccupying human activity and concerns due to the COVID‐19 pandemic. Although for a long time there has been fear associated with ‘germs’, notably viruses and bacteria and the diseases they cause, the pandemic has set these fears into overdrive. As serious as this ongoing event is, there are...

The food system is a crucial vehicle in sustaining people and their health, their human right to food. Food loss and waste risk this and other rights in driving negative economic, social, and environmental impacts. Food waste is usually characterised as waste occurring post supply chain, such as at the household, rather than food loss, occurring wi...

With a myriad of associated health, ecological and social benefits, urban greening has become a prominent policy strategy to renew historically neglected sites in cities, so popular that its implementation often eludes scrutiny. Utilising resident interviews, this paper investigates the distribution of ‘wellbeing’ narratives and objectives in such...

Across all landscape types, environmental managers work with communities to conserve biodiversity. The effectiveness of conservation practice, however, relies on acknowledging differences in preferences and values of nature. Implementing urban conservation is challenging because cities have diverse social, cultural and ecological attributes, meanin...

This special feature concerns understanding human‐nature relations through the lens of values to comprehend how values of the natural world connect with wider processes of change, action and transformation in social‐ecological systems. The relationships between values and action have preoccupied several disciplines and multiple discourses concerned...

Whether new technologies will have a positive impact on how societies experience nature depends on how particular devices and populations come to interact. This paper reviews two bodies of work that have sought to understand and influence these interactions with reference to the smartphone. The first is associated with a group of researchers intere...

Urban greening is a popular nature-led regeneration policy based on the assumption that provision of greenspace improves the health and wellbeing of proximate communities. Entangled within these objectives are environmental justice principles that seek to remedy historical and contemporary concerns related to contaminated areas of post-industrial c...

Different ways of thinking and understanding urban problems and imagining solutions are needed to redress the suite of serious challenges facing cities. Focusing on urban nature, this conceptual paper begins from the standpoint that nature-based solutions (NBS) could help remake cities as places for more than just people; in other words, cities cou...

Urban environments provide an opportunity to conserve biodiversity while engaging people with urban nature. This booklet shares the perspectives and experiences of environmental managers who are working to conserve urban biodiversity and highlights key considerations for implementing new conservation projects. The information will be of interest to...

Conserving native biodiversity in cities involves addressing social and ecological factors that contribute to the persistence of species. Multiple activities and programs are needed, with the participation of land managers across private and public realms; from householders to state and local governments. There are few planning and assessment tools...

Current global enthusiasm for urban greening and bringing nature back into cities is unprecedented. Evidence of the socioecological benefits of large, permanent greenspaces is mounting, but the collective potential for pop‐up parks (PUPs) – small, temporary greenspaces – to augment urban ecosystem services is unknown. To showcase the potential of P...

Urban greenspaces play a key role in the health and wellbeing and quality of life of residents. Several studies have documented the physiological, environmental and social benefits of parks and formal greenspaces for urban dwellers. The contribution of informal greenspaces and their potential uses and benefits, however, have received very little at...

The purpose of this research report is to identify current approaches to urban biodiversity conservation in Australian cities and identify opportunities and challenges for undertaking future actions. This project forms the first Australian assessment of its kind, where findings can be used to facilitate improved practice.

In this paper we engage the twin concepts of ‘the stray’ and ‘the friend’ for developing empathetic imaginings towards ethical practices in the city. We build on Gruen’s (2015) notion of ‘entangled empathy’ as a critical pathway for realising more-than-human cities. Critical theory, frameworks and methods work to challenge anthropocentrism, shiftin...

Health and equity present obligations and currently under-realised opportunities in low carbon transitions. Energy efficiency improvements of homes may benefit health and access to affordable energy, yet better knowledge about contextual mechanisms and household practices is needed for the development of effective programs. This paper presents a mi...

As nature protection and rewilding initiatives gain momentum around the globe there is renewed focus on the potential health and social benefits of interactions with nature for individual people and communities. Among other benefits, ‘rewilding’1 has been promoted as a means of reconnecting people with nature, addressing the so-called ‘nature defic...

Cambridge Core - Natural Resource Management, Agriculture, Horticulture and forestry - Rewilding - edited by Nathalie Pettorelli

This chapter is concerned with how human bodies are conceptualised in theories of practice. It stems from two contentions. The first is that many dynamic aspects of bodies appear underplayed in work drawing on theories of practice. This is an issue when it comes to understanding topics like health and wellbeing and how bodies (human and non-human)...

Social practice theories have been influential in understanding contemporary social and environmental problems from a post-humanist perspective, recognising a variety of roles played by materials, technologies, and infrastructures in the (re)making of everyday life. But questions remain about how well these theories can conceptualise the distribute...

The robots are coming! So too is the ‘age of automation’, the march of ‘invasive’ species, more intense natural disasters, and a potential cataclysm of other unprecedented events and phenomena of which we do not yet know, and cannot predict. This book is concerned with how to account for these non-humans and their effects within theories of social...

The vital importance of nature to people, and of people to the future of that nature, is self‐evident. The understanding of those linkages is, nonetheless, being critically transformed and enriched by research that transcends the barriers between ecology and other traditional disciplines. Such studies are not new, but the dramatic growth in their n...

One of climate change’s most certain impacts is increasingly frequent and extreme heat. Heat management and climate adaptation policies generally utilize temperature and humidity thresholds to identify what constitute ‘‘extreme’’ conditions. In the workplace, such thresholds can be used to trigger reductions in work intensity and/or duration. In re...

The ever-increasing process of urbanisation across the globe has major implications for the environment, biodiversity and health and wellbeing of urbanites. Urban greenspaces are considered a promising planning tool in tackling some of the problems associated with urbanisation such as pollution and urban heat island effects. It is, therefore, impor...

As cities are recognised as hotspots for biodiversity, urban greening interventions are becoming more important. Such initiatives are promoted as having multiple benefits for nonhumans and humans alike, infused with narratives of climate change adaptation and positive health outcomes. Yet little research has critically examined how residents of cit...

As the world's population is becoming more urbanised, there is growing recognition of greenspaces as a promising planning tool in tackling problems associated with urbanisation. An increasing body of research highlights the physiological, environmental and social benefits of urban greenspaces for urbanites. So far, however, very little attention ha...

The increasing process of urbanisation has major implications for the environment, biodiversity, and health and well-being of urban residents. Empirical evidence for urban greening benefits suggests that it is an appropriate planning and policy approach for tackling some of the problems associated with urbanisation, including biodiversity loss and...

This paper presents a multi-method (interviews, cost-benefit analysis, technical monitoring) longitudinal evaluation of ten social housing dwellings in Horsham (Victoria, Australia), including four low-energy and six control houses. Occupants of the low-energy houses purchased 45-62% less electricity, had lower utility bills resulting in financial...

Drawing on evidence from a mixed methods retrofit intervention trial of the homes of low-income, older and frail people in Victoria, Australia, this study explored practices of heating and keeping warm in terms of equity and health. In most homes, heating restrictions led to inadequate indoor temperatures. Adaptation practices increased householder...

Residential energy efficiency interventions are complex social and construction programmes that may benefit health, yet the interactions between the material improvements, health and health-related outcomes, and householder responses are not well understood. While indoor winter warmth and householder satisfaction have been identified as the key med...

Conserving biodiversity and advancing wellbeing are goals usually siloed in environment or health portfolios, yet compelling evidence is emerging regarding the relationship between these activities. There is increasing academic and practitioner interest in the wellbeing benefits to be gained from experiencing nature in urban parks. Here we explore...

http://bit.ly/2t7JYtz © EBR Media Ltd, 2017. The definitive, and edited version of this article is published in The World Financial Review July/August 2017 edition www.worldfinancialreview.com

Empirical work on household consumption informed by theories of social practice has grown exponentially in the last few years. This is partly due to conceptual developments positing practices as being comprised of materials, meanings and skills. Such formulations are readily applied to empirical investigations. As the aim of a growing body of empir...

The Selandra Rise master-planned estate (MPE) in Melbourne’s south-east growth corridor was designed to create a “healthy and engaged community” through the provision of parks, physical activity opportunities and community facilities. A 5 year longitudinal study researched the impact on residents. Over one third of residents spent 2 to 3 h per day...

Recent climate change adaptation policy positions previously mundane weather events, such as heatwaves and coldsnaps, as increasingly dangerous. Within this discourse of ‘extreme’ weather, the health sector is promoting climate-controlled indoor environments as a sensible coping strategy. Such responses mask our constant and ongoing adaptations to...

This paper presents a multi-method (interviews, cost-benefit analysis, technical monitoring) longitudinal evaluation of ten social housing dwellings in Horsham (Victoria, Australia), including four low-energy and six control houses. Occupants of the low-energy houses purchased 45-62% less electricity, had lower utility bills resulting in financial...

The ever-increasing process of urbanisation across the globe will have major implications for the environment, biodiversity and health and well-being of urbanites. There is growing recognition of greening as a promising planning tool in tackling problems associated with urbanisation, including biodiversity loss and heat island effects. Domestic gar...

The outcomes of our 3 year evaluation into sustainable housing and low income households for the Department of Health and Human Services

Master-planned estates are a major source of new housing for growing cities. Much research finds these residential developments lack genuine social connections between residents despite marketing of ‘close-knit’ community. Selandra Rise is a new residential development on the urban fringe of Melbourne, Australia. The estate was planned with a focus...

The resilient urban systems project aims to improve understanding of motivations to develop new systems of energy and water provision, opportunities and barriers to implementation and changes in practice resulting from these new systems. This brief is one of a number of project outputs that include journal articles, progress and final reports.

Increasing reliance on air-conditioning to improve summertime comfort in dwellings results in higher energy bills, peak electricity demand and environmental issues. In pursuit of social equity, society needs to develop ways of improving cooling that are less reliant on air-conditioning. Designing homes to emphasize adaptive thermal comfort can redu...

The importance of neighbourhood design for health outcomes is well-established. Yet interactions between people and neighbourhood features, and how they are incorporated into daily routines, remain conceptually and empirically underdeveloped. Using theories of social practice this paper foregrounds the materiality of neighbourhoods to understand th...

There is an over reliance on cost-benefit analysis in the policy development and evaluation of sustainable housing outcomes. This paper presents both qualitative and quantitative analyses from a multi-year mixed methods evaluation of four new low-carbon social houses in regional Victoria, Australia. Through a cost-benefit lens the housing was not f...

The operation of public transport service in suburban developments, particularly new greenfield developments, can face considerable challenges. Suburban developments are often served primarily through bus transit, which struggles to balance a mass transit function against a social transit (e.g., local service) function. As a result, many suburban n...

In October 2014, the ‘Practices, the Built Environment and Sustainability’ (PBES) network produced a Thinking Note Collection, with the intention of fostering collaboration between network members, consolidating some initial thinking and ideas, as well as to provide an output to drive new discussions with other interested colleagues. The Collection...

This paper is Part 1 of a realist review that tries to explain the impacts of residential energy efficiency interventions (REEIs) on householder health. According to recent systematic reviews residential energy efficiency interventions may benefit health. It is argued that home energy improvement are complex interventions and that a better understa...

The importance of recognising structure and agency in health research to move beyond methodological individualism is well documented. To progress incorporating social theory into health, researchers have used Giddens’ and Bourdieu’s conceptualisations of ‘social practice’ to understand relationships between agency, structure and health. However, so...

In international energy policy, programmes and consumer research, a dominant ideal consumer is emerging. This consumer is typically a human adult who has the agency to make autonomous, functional and rational decisions about his or her household?s energy consumption. This article seeks to disrupt this dominant anthropocentric conceptualisation of t...

Rising carbon and water footprints of housing present a significant policy challenge across the Westernized world, and this has led to a growing range of government policies and programmes designed to promote greater residential energy and water efficiency. An analysis of low carbon/energy renovations is presented based on interviews with homeowner...

Renovation/retrofit is a key policy measure to reduce energy and emissions in existing residential stock. Existing approaches are typically based on assumptions about individual attitudes and technical–rational models, reliant on regulations and incentive programmes to influence homeowner ‘behaviour’. However, insufficient evaluation, together with...

Social practice theories provide a unique platform for understanding how everyday practices become globalised through migration, spreading from one place to another, replacing local, often more sustainable, variations. Set in the context of the spreading of resource-intensive practices such as multiple daily showers, we explore the movement and mig...

Policies to secure energy and water supplies from the impacts of climate change are currently being developed or are in place in many developed nations. Little is known about how these policies of security, and the systems of resource provision they prioritise, affect householders’ capacity to adapt to climate change. To better understand the conne...

There are many technical innovations for reducing water and energy use in residential housing, predominantly for new homes, but also for existing housing stock (administered through renovations). Alongside this, householders can reduce energy and water use by changing their behaviour. Although Australian Bureau of Statistics data shows Australians...

Health, housing, and energy policies to address hot weather and heatwaves are typically based on divided 'technical' and 'behavioural' strategies and tend to be developed in isolation. This approach results in conflicting outcomes both within and across public policies, potentially leaving households more vulnerable to heat. The cooling practices o...

Ageing domestic housing stock is frequently remodelled and remade to suit homeowners' aspirations and to comply with changing expectations about the home, its appearance and function. In the context of preparing for climate change, it can be argued that significant improvements to existing stock and changes to how it is inhabited are required to im...

In many places extreme heat causes more deaths than floods, cyclones and bushfires. However, efforts to manage the health implications of heat and increase the adaptive capacity of vulnerable populations are in their infancy, requiring urgent attention from research and policy. This paper presents a case for research exploring the influence of soci...

Undertaking home renovation is complex and traumatic, but remains a ubiquitous phenomenon. Home renovators wishing to reduce their environmental impact encounter added layers of complexity. Increasingly, opportunities to improve a dwelling's performance present themselves in the course of home renovations, giving rise to "green renovations". Policy...

It is estimated that half of the world's population now live in urban environments. Urban living necessitates a removal from nature, yet evidence indicates that contact with nature is beneficial for human health. In fact, everyday urban places, such as where people live, study, and work, provide opportunities to bring nature back into cities to con...

Purpose This paper aims to determine educators' perceptions about the benefits of contact with nature for children's mental, emotional and social health. Design/methodology/approach The approach was exploratory using qualitative methods. Face‐to‐face interviews were conducted with school principals and teachers as well as professionals from the en...

Ed. note: With the increasing recognition of the value of nature to human health and well-being, Parks Victoria will host the first International Healthy Parks Healthy People Congress in 2010. The aim of the congress is to raise awareness of recent research, highlight case stud-ies, and facilitate discussion regarding the advantages of, and opportu...

The increase in mental health disorders worldwide makes it important to recognise health promotion interventions that are effective, accessible and affordable. Although natural spaces are coming to be recognised as health-promoting settings for general populations, little is understood about the use of nature-contact in treatment and care for indiv...

Whilst urban-dwelling individuals who seek out parks and gardens appear to intuitively understand the personal health and well-being benefits arising from 'contact with nature', public health strategies are yet to maximize the untapped resource nature provides, including the benefits of nature contact as an upstream health promotion intervention fo...

Whilst urban-dwelling individuals who seek out parks and gardens appear to intuitively understand the personal health and well-being benefits arising from ‘contact with nature’, public health strategies are yet to maximize the untapped resource nature provides, including the benefits of nature contact as an upstream health promotion intervention fo...

This study consisted of a survey of dairy farmers and their milking sheds at 198 Victorian dairy farms to examine the relationships between physical features in the milking shed and a number of job-related characteristics of the farmer, such as attitudes to handling cows and job satisfaction. Furthermore, farmers’ opinions of the effects of specifi...

In contrast to recent understandings of community beyond place, urban partnerships of developers and policymakers focus on creating place-based communities in new neighbourhoods such as master-planned housing estates. These efforts are critiqued for ignoring the multiple ways community is experienced in everyday life as physical places take precede...

This annotated bibliography is part of a joint initiative between Parks Victoria, the International Park Strategic Partners Group, and Deakin University. All organisations recognise the significance of the health and wellbeing benefits from interacting with nature in park settings, the implications for public health, and the lack of collated inform...

This review identifies significant research that has not previously been compiled. It will provide key information for decision making by park managers, forming the basis of a program of future research to overcome the limited knowledge in this area. It is part of stage two of this project, funded by the International Park Strategic Partners Group....

The Common Keel, Eudynamys scolopacea, is a migratory cuckoo that occurs along the eastern coast of Australia. Its most conspicuous feature is the loud and persistent calling of males heard throughout the breeding season. Although the commonest vocalisation of the Keel, the Cooee call, is well known, other vocalisations have not been described in d...

The Australian Government acting through the Bureau of Rural Sciences has exercised due care and skill in the preparation and compilation of the information and data set out in this publication. Notwithstanding, the Bureau of Rural Sciences, its employees and advisers disclaim all liability, including liability for negligence, for any loss, damage,...

Introduction:This paper describes an audience segmentation study that highlights several areas where current social marketing strategies in relation to reducing factory farmed meat consumption could be more effectively applied. The need to address factory farming (intensive animal agriculture) and meat consumption is supported by a large body of ev...