How do we know about resilience? An analysis of empirical research on resilience, and implications for interdisciplinary praxis
We sought to understand how knowledge about resilience is produced. We examined empirical research into resilience from the social and natural sciences, randomly selected a sample of these studies and analysed their methods using common criteria to enable comparison. We found that studies of resilie...
| Main Authors: | , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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IOP Publishing
2013-01-01
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| Series: | Environmental Research Letters |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/8/1/014041 |
| _version_ | 1797748489863561216 |
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| author | Barbara J Downes Fiona Miller Jon Barnett Alena Glaister Heidi Ellemor |
| author_facet | Barbara J Downes Fiona Miller Jon Barnett Alena Glaister Heidi Ellemor |
| author_sort | Barbara J Downes |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | We sought to understand how knowledge about resilience is produced. We examined empirical research into resilience from the social and natural sciences, randomly selected a sample of these studies and analysed their methods using common criteria to enable comparison. We found that studies of resilience from social scientists largely focus on the response of individuals to human-induced change events, while those from natural scientists largely focus on the response of ecological communities and populations to both environmental and human-induced change events. Most studies were of change over short time periods and focused on small spatial scales. Social science studies were dominated by one-off surveys, whereas natural science studies used a diversity of study designs to draw inferences about cause-and-effect. Whilst these differences typically reflect epistemological and methodological traditions, they also imply quite different understandings of resilience. We suggest that there are significant methodological barriers to producing empirical evidence about interactions between complex social and ecological systems. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-12T16:06:30Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-5db7046220af4f2ab2a05a7616177cde |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1748-9326 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-12T16:06:30Z |
| publishDate | 2013-01-01 |
| publisher | IOP Publishing |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Environmental Research Letters |
| spelling | doaj.art-5db7046220af4f2ab2a05a7616177cde2023-08-09T14:21:15ZengIOP PublishingEnvironmental Research Letters1748-93262013-01-018101404110.1088/1748-9326/8/1/014041How do we know about resilience? An analysis of empirical research on resilience, and implications for interdisciplinary praxisBarbara J Downes0Fiona Miller1Jon Barnett2Alena Glaister3Heidi Ellemor4Department of Resource Management and Geography, The University of Melbourne , Victoria 3010, AustraliaDepartment of Resource Management and Geography, The University of Melbourne , Victoria 3010, AustraliaDepartment of Resource Management and Geography, The University of Melbourne , Victoria 3010, AustraliaDepartment of Resource Management and Geography, The University of Melbourne , Victoria 3010, AustraliaDepartment of Resource Management and Geography, The University of Melbourne , Victoria 3010, AustraliaWe sought to understand how knowledge about resilience is produced. We examined empirical research into resilience from the social and natural sciences, randomly selected a sample of these studies and analysed their methods using common criteria to enable comparison. We found that studies of resilience from social scientists largely focus on the response of individuals to human-induced change events, while those from natural scientists largely focus on the response of ecological communities and populations to both environmental and human-induced change events. Most studies were of change over short time periods and focused on small spatial scales. Social science studies were dominated by one-off surveys, whereas natural science studies used a diversity of study designs to draw inferences about cause-and-effect. Whilst these differences typically reflect epistemological and methodological traditions, they also imply quite different understandings of resilience. We suggest that there are significant methodological barriers to producing empirical evidence about interactions between complex social and ecological systems.https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/8/1/014041social scienceecological sciencemethodologyevidencestudy design |
| spellingShingle | Barbara J Downes Fiona Miller Jon Barnett Alena Glaister Heidi Ellemor How do we know about resilience? An analysis of empirical research on resilience, and implications for interdisciplinary praxis Environmental Research Letters social science ecological science methodology evidence study design |
| title | How do we know about resilience? An analysis of empirical research on resilience, and implications for interdisciplinary praxis |
| title_full | How do we know about resilience? An analysis of empirical research on resilience, and implications for interdisciplinary praxis |
| title_fullStr | How do we know about resilience? An analysis of empirical research on resilience, and implications for interdisciplinary praxis |
| title_full_unstemmed | How do we know about resilience? An analysis of empirical research on resilience, and implications for interdisciplinary praxis |
| title_short | How do we know about resilience? An analysis of empirical research on resilience, and implications for interdisciplinary praxis |
| title_sort | how do we know about resilience an analysis of empirical research on resilience and implications for interdisciplinary praxis |
| topic | social science ecological science methodology evidence study design |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/8/1/014041 |
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