Naturehood Research Information Consent

Naturehood is a community science research project.

Before you decide whether or not to take part, it is important you understand why the research is being done and what it will involve.

Please take time to read the following information carefully and confirm that you agree to us using your data for our research. You can discuss this with your friends and family if you wish. You can contact the Naturehood team at any time (before, during and after your involvement with Naturehood) to ask questions, get more information, or for other clarification at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

You are free to decide whether or not to take part and may withdraw from Naturehood at any time.

Why Naturehood?

Private green spaces (e.g. gardens, balconies, and other outdoor spaces, which we term ‘Naturespaces’) present a key opportunity to help reverse the persistent decline in UK wildlife. However, due to their inaccessibility, we know very little about their suitability for wildlife and how we can improve them. That’s why we need your help. By completing surveys and doing Naturehood actions (such as putting in a nest box or stopping using pesticides) in your Naturespace you will help us understand:

What factors influence the effectiveness of Naturehood actions in supporting biodiversity.
The impact of spatial scale (e.g. how many ponds do you need in an area to make a tangible difference to frog populations?)
How best to achieve, facilitate and accelerate the implementation of the most effective Naturehood actions.
The benefits of engaging in gardening for wildlife.

This will help us to make recommendations to other communities, businesses and government to effect positive environmental change both for people and wildlife.

What’s involved?

We need to know where your Naturespace is, what’s in your Naturespace, what benefits you get from your Naturespace, and what motivates you to manage your Naturespace for wildlife. We will do this through short surveys (including Naturespace biodiversity and action surveys) and looking at how engagement with the social and engagement aspects of the platform drive action. You will be asked to repeat certain surveys multiple times (e.g. Naturespace action logs) to give us an overview of how Naturespaces change over time and the response of wildlife to these changes. Other surveys (e.g. the Me and My Naturespace survey) will be one-offs.

You can also become more involved in Naturehood, such as by becoming a street rep or leading your own Naturehood community.

There is no planned end date for Naturehood. Your level and length of involvement is entirely up to you. You will be given an estimation of the time involved in performing a survey at the start of each survey.

There are payment options on the site but no payment is required to be a Naturehood participant. Incentives may be offered to participate in Naturehood e.g. competition, discount to wildlife store etc. These incentives will always be appropriate to the time involved and will never be cash.

Naturehood Team

Naturehood is a programme operated by Earthwatch Europe.

The researchers overseeing the project (at the time of signing) are:

Dr Toos van Noordwijk
Dr Daniel Hayhow
Dr Claire Narraway

You can contact the Naturehood team by emailing: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Risks of involvement

Any activity has possible risks associated with it. The activities in Naturehood may cause all, some, or none of the risks listed. Unknown or unexpected risks may also occur.

Risks include:

Adverse weather conditions including strong sun/hot weather
Injury (e.g. from constructing hedgehog house, slipping, tripping etc)
Rashes/reactions/stings/scratches/bites from garden plants and wildlife
Working near water – drowning or Weils’ disease
Falling tree branches.

Participation in Naturehood is at your own risk.

How we will capture, manage and use your data

Taking part in this study will involve collecting private information about you. Data sources are: surveys (performed online or on paper), interviews, and text, photos and videos shared on Naturehood discussion boards.

This information will be protected in the following ways:

All data is stored on secure systems.
When downloaded your email address will be disassociated from the data and a unique identifier (UserID) added.
All data is collected using the survey platform Alchemer and held on their systems in the US. These are GDPR Alchemer’s terms and conditions can be found at: terms of use, privacy policy. This data will be transferred to Earthwatch Europe’s internal systems.
Downloaded data will be stored on Earthwatch Europe’s internal systems and our IONOS Cloud server.
Only Earthwatch Europe staff will have access to your data.
Any change to these systems will always be secure and GDPR compliant in order to protect your privacy.

Data is intended to inform environmental management advice, policy, and engagement practices. As such:

Data that you provide will be held by Earthwatch and shared with external researchers when appropriate and governed by legally binding agreements that protect participant anonymity.
Anonymised data will be shared with open repositories allowing other conservation organisations and researchers to use the data in their own analyses.
Anonymised data may also be shared with participants to perform their own analyses.

Information about you will be combined with information from other people taking part in Naturehood. We will write about the combined data we have gathered. Outputs from this study will not identify you unless we ask and obtain your permission.

Upon withdrawing from Naturehood, if you have not requested to be forgotten, we may re-contact you to request your participation in follow-up Naturehood studies or other Earthwatch programmes.

Earthwatch Europe is committed to protecting and respecting your privacy and holding your personal information in compliance with the General Data Protection Regulation. Read our full privacy policy at https://earthwatch.org.uk/privacy-policy.

Your rights

You can withdraw from Naturehood at any time, without penalty by emailing This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

If you don’t participate in Naturehood you can still access wildlife friendly gardening resources from www.naturehood.uk and sites such as www.wildlifetrusts.org/gardening.

You have the right to:

A copy of the information we hold about you
Withdraw consent at any time
Change your personal information
Request the deletion or removal of your personal information in certain circumstances, including where it is no longer necessary for us to hold it for the purposes for which we are processing it
Restrict our processing of your data if there is disagreement about its accuracy or legitimate usage
Move, copy or transfer your personal information easily and safely from one IT environment to another, in some circumstances
Object to processing based on legitimate interests.

Please note that these rights are not exercisable in all circumstances e.g. personal data may not have to be erased if it is needed in the interests of public health, or to support legal claims, compliance and scientific or historical research.

You can enact these rights by contacting This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. and providing us with your full name, the projects that you have been involved in with us, and the action you would like to take.

Earthwatch rights

Participant’s participation may be terminated if the participant persistently or severly breaches Naturehood’s Terms of Use which includes but is not limited to:

Posting of obscene or offensive language or material.
Posting defamatory, abusive, discriminatory or hateful material or applauding or encouraging such material.
Posting confidential material/private information.

Participants will be informed before such action is taken.

Reporting concerns

If you have questions about your rights as a Naturehood participant, or you want to make sure this is a valid study, you may contact the Earthwatch Ethics Committee. The Earthwatch Ethics Committee is comprised of internal and external members of staff and all projects are assessed by members not associated with the project. This is the Committee that is responsible for overseeing the safety of all Naturehood participants.

Please email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. if you have questions, complaints or concerns about the study or if you would like to obtain information or offer input.

Participant Consent

By signing up to Naturehood I agree to the following.

Taking part in the study

I have read and understood the above information, or it has been read to me. I have been able to ask questions about Naturehood and my questions have been satisfactorily answered.
I consent voluntarily to be a participant in Naturehood and understand that I can refuse to answer questions and I can withdraw from the study at any time, without having to give a reason. I do this by informing the Naturehood team at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
I understand that taking part in Naturehood requires me to provide data and that this will involve taking part in online or paper surveys, and use of the social features on the Naturehood platform.

Use of my data in the study

I understand that data which can identify me will only be shared beyond the Earthwatch team where absolutely necessary for research purposes and governed by strict confidentiality agreements that protect my anonymity.
I agree that the data provided by me may be used for the following purposes:

Presentation and discussion of the project and its results in research activities (e.g. project meetings, conferences)
Publications and reports describing the project and its results
Dissemination of the project and its results, including publication of data on web pages and databases.

I give permission for my words to be quoted for the purposes described above.
I give permission for my visual image, or that of my Naturespace, contained in photos or video gathered during the research to be used or the purposes described above.

Reuse of my data

I give permission for the data that I provide to be reused for the sole purposes of future research and learning.
I understand and agree that this may involve depositing my data in a data repository, which may be accessed by other researchers.

Security of my data

I understand that safeguards will be put in place to protect my identity and my data during the research, and if my data is kept for future use.
I confirm that I have been described these safeguards, told how to relocate them on the Naturehood FAQs, and that they are acceptable to me.
I understand that no computer system is completely secure but all practicable steps will be taken to protect my data and my anonymity.

Copyright

I give permission for data gathered during this project to be used, copied, excerpted, annotated, displayed and distributed for the purposes to which I have consented.