Nature and Human Nature: Bridging Ecology, Behavioral Science, and Policy for a Sustainable Oceans Future

How can we effectively, equitably, and enduringly align human use of coastal ecosystems with their long-term sustainability? In this talk, I present a research program that integrates ecology, behavioral science, and policy to examine the interplay of nature and human nature in nearshore social–ecological systems. I illustrate this approach through coastal and marine tourism—the largest sector of the global ocean economy and an ostensibly non-extractive form of reef use. I first examine how coral reefs and coastal tourism interact across large spatial scales, revealing striking heterogeneity in visitation pressure and ecological outcomes across the Hawaiian archipelago. I then connect these broad patterns to fine-scale behavioral observations, linking minute-by-minute decisions by reef visitors to measurable ecological outcomes across field sites in Southeast Asia. Throughout, I demonstrate how integrating evidence across scales can inform practical conservation decisions, management strategies, and policy design. I conclude with my current research and a forward-looking agenda focused on identifying and resolving cross-scale tensions between coral reefs and the communities that depend on them, using variation in outcomes as leverage to understand when, where, and for whom social–ecological resilience emerges in a rapidly changing world.