Authors: Samus, Andreas; van Heezik, Yolanda;Freeman, Claire;Dickinson, Katharine;

Private gardens cover a substantial amount of space in urban areas and thus they have an immense impact on urban biodiversity. Our study uses an extended version of the Theory of Planned Behavior, a widely used theory to explain human behavior, to identify factors that predict feature richness in private gardens (i.e., the number of plant and non-plant-based features that provide habitats for wildlife). Using survey data from 695 urban dwellers from four cities in New Zealand, we show that householders’ intention to engage in wildlife gardening was associated with feature richness in their gardens. Attitudes towards the behavior, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control as well as nature connectedness were significant predictors of the intention to engage in wildlife gardening practices. We conclude that the Theory of Planned Behavior, with nature connectedness as an additional predictor, is well suited to explain householders’ engagement in wildlife gardening practices. Furthermore, we explored the beliefs that determine attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control. Access to information and knowledge had the strongest association with perceived behavioral control. Subjective norms were predicted by householders’ normative beliefs about friends, family, and environmentalists. The findings can help develop effective interventions to increase urban biodiversity.