The influence of planned-change context on the evaluation of natural landscapes

The influence of planned-change context on evaluations of natural landscape s was examined in an experimental setting. Five landscape photographs, depi cting one agrarian landscape and four natural landscapes with varying degre es of human influence, were either presented as 'five existing Dutch landsc apes', or as 'one existing landscape and four plans for nature development from this landscape'. Respondents were asked to evaluate the landscapes fro m one of three perspectives that matched their own background and interests , i.e. the perspective of a rural resident, the perspective of a cyclist, o r a neutral perspective. As predicted, planned-change context negatively af fected the perceived beauty of natural landscapes, particularly if landscap es were judged from a user perspective, and if natural landscapes had a low degree of human influence. Planned-change context did not affect relative preferences for natural landscapes in pairwise comparisons with the agraria n landscape. It is concluded that at least part of the beauty perceived in natural landscapes is derived from the knowledge that people bring into the ir aesthetic judgments. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.