A group of Researchers led by the University of Nebraska conducted research into the number of pictures found in Caldecott Medal winning books from 1938 (the year in which the first prize was awarded) up to today. The research involved the examining of the images found in books and the types of images that the books included, whether that be natural environments or “built” or “modified” environments such as parks or houses, and, wild, not domesticated animals. The research concluded that over the last two decades, the presence of pictures of natural environments in books “have all but disappeared”, whereas in older books, the proportion of natural to modified environments was relatively balanced. These researchers have linked their conclusions to other studies showing that both children and adults are, all in all, visiting natural environments such as national parks less regularly than they once were.
Read the original article here.
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