Abstract
Understanding what drives environmentally protective or destructive behavior is important to the design and implementation of effective public policies to encourage people's engagement in proenvironmental behavior (PEB). Research shows that a connection to nature is associated with greater engagement in PEB. However, the variety of instruments and methods used in these studies poses a major barrier to integrating research findings. We conducted a meta‐analysis of the relationship between connection to nature and PEB. We identified studies through a systematic review of the literature and used Comprehensive Meta‐Analysis software to analyze the results from 37 samples ( n = 13,237) and to test for moderators. A random‐effects model demonstrated a positive and significant association between connection to nature and PEB ( r = 0.42, 95% CI 0.36, 0.47, p