Developing social-ecological system indicators using group model building

Thresholds in Ecological and Social–Ecological Systems: a Developing Database

Increasing interest in regime shifts in ecological and linked social–ecological systems (SESs) has placed a strong focus on the thresholds of change. However, research into this topic has been hampered by a lack of empirical data. This paper describes a developing database established to address this need. The database is freely available and comprises a set of summarized published examples and...

Developing conservation targets in social-ecological systems

The development of targets is foundational in conservation. Although progress has been made in setting targets, the diverse linkages among ecological and social components make target setting for coupled social-ecological systems extremely challenging. Developing integrated social-ecological targets is difficult because it forces policy makers to consider how management actions propagate throug...

Group Model Building

Building Ecological Models Using Genetic Programming

This paper reports on preliminary research using genetic programming (GP) to model the spatial distribution of an endangered Australian marsupial, the southern brown bandicoot(Isoodon obesulus). GP is compared in this work with classical decision tree learning. The models built by GP are surprisingly robust, generalising signiicantly better than those built by decision trees.

Application of Ecological Indicators*

Ecological indicators have widespread appeal to scientists, environmental managers, and the general public. Indicators have long been used to detect changes in nature, but the scientific maturation in indicator development primarily has occurred in the past 40 years. Currently, indicators are mainly used to assess the condition of the environment, as early-warning signals of ecological problems...