Looking Beyond English Language Conservation Research

Despite a bias toward English-language scientific publications, studies published in other languages have made substantial progress across a variety of fields including virology, epidemiology, and ecology. Still, there remains a common belief that any important scientific research would be available in English. Although this is a general issue for the scientific community, it is particularly problematic for areas of research that have global consequences.

One such area is the challenge of conserving global biodiversity. Drawing on all available studies is crucial as society continues to face ever-increasing extinctions with important gaps in scientific knowledge. Research in languages other than English offers a body of largely untapped knowledge and can be useful for informing large-scale coordinated efforts and highlighting issues outside of Western settings.

A recent paper reveals just how important it is to pay attention to non-English-language biodiversity research. To carry out the study, the research team screened nearly half a million peer-reviewed papers across 16 languages. Their specific aim was to test four common perceptions:

• The number of relevant conservation studies that are available only in non-English languages is minor.
• The number of relevant studies being published in languages other than English has been getting smaller over time.
• Studies published in non-English languages are less rigorous and robust in their design than those published in English.
• Evidence published in English is representative of evidence published across all languages.

The first perception was quickly debunked: The team identified 1,234 non-English-language studies aimed at conserving and benefiting biodiversity, compared to 4,412 English-language studies. Among the studies that weren’t in English, 53 focused on amphibians, 247 on birds, and 161 on mammals compared to 284 English papers on amphibians, 1,115 on birds, and 1,154 on mammals. Thus, conservation professionals would benefit by broadening their horizons and considering research published in languages other than English.

Addressing the second perception, the researchers found that the annual number of relevant studies published in languages other than English has actually increased over time for French, German, Japanese, Portuguese, Russian, and simplified Chinese research. The other languages did not show a significant change in quantity over time. This means the belief that the number of relevant studies published in languages other than English has been decreasing over time is plainly false.

The third perception was partially supported by the team’s results. Specifically, they found that in 10 of the 16 non-English languages studied, study designs were indeed less robust than those published in English. This is no small issue, as scientific rigor is key to making progress on any issue, let alone one as challenging as global biodiversity conservation. In the other six languages, four didn’t have enough studies to draw meaningful comparisons to English-language studies, while two (Portuguese and Spanish) showed no difference in rigor and robustness compared to English-language studies. However, it’s important to remember that academics outside of the English-speaking world may also have fewer resources at their disposal to produce comparable conservation research. This is an issue that academics and advocates can work together to address. 

Finally, the authors also disproved the theory that English-language studies are representative of the overall body of evidence in worldwide conservation. Indeed, when considering global regions covered by conservation research, the non-English-language studies expanded the geographical coverage of English-language studies by 25%. Breaking this down by taxa, the team found that non-English-language studies expanded the geographical coverage of amphibians by12%, birds by 16%, and mammals by 12%, compared to English studies. Presented another way, non-English-language studies showed that conservation interventions were effective for an additional 9 amphibian, 217 bird, and 64 mammal species that were not covered by English-language studies. These papers also increased the research on threatened birds by 23% and threatened mammals by 3%. 

In short, doing more to include studies in languages other than English when researching and engaging in conservation efforts can help to solve many problems. Among these are reducing bias in peer-reviewed literature and acknowledging voices outside of the Western world. Studies in other languages can inform and indeed fill gaps in areas that are unavailable or understudied in English, especially in an area as diverse as global biodiversity conservation. This matters greatly for animal and climate advocacy, as our work could be substantially more effective by paying attention to scholarship outside of the English-speaking world. As such, it’s important for advocates to collaborate in mutually beneficial ways with native speakers in other countries, and to push conservation professionals to consider local ecosystem knowledge when designing conservation programs.