Heterogeneous preferences for use and non‐use values provided by insects

Abstract Public support is essential for reversing insect declines, yet conservation efforts often focus on instrumental values, particularly pollination and pest regulation, while overlooking the many and varied cultural ecosystem services that may underpin broader public support for conservation. Incorporating the diversity of cultural services into conservation decisions requires a deeper understanding of the use and non‐use values provided by insects. Our work disentangles a non‐consumptive use value (encountering insects), and two non‐use values (existence and bequest), within a choice experiment delivered across Britain and a validated self‐reported well‐being scale (BIO‐WELL). We focused on three diverse insect taxonomic groups (bees, beetles, and wasps) as a model system. We found that public preferences were heterogeneous. A latent class model demonstrated that 42% of respondents were pro‐insect, and these respondents had a positive willingness to pay (WTP) for increases in the area managed for insects across all taxa; 26% were insect‐averse with consistent negative WTP, and 32% were ambivalent with insect‐specific preferences. Across all latent classes, respondents distinguished between use and non‐use values. For example, our pro‐insect class reported higher WTP for the bequest value of preserving insects for future generations than for encountering insects today. We show that WTP for changes in the area managed for insects shifted from negative to positive for those respondents who derived higher well‐being from current insect populations, especially for our ambivalent class. Our study makes two contributions. Methodologically, we characterise the heterogeneity of public preferences among these use and non‐use values derived from insects. Practically, our results suggest that public support for conservation decisions may be enhanced by emphasising longer‐term, intergenerational benefits, even for uncharismatic or unfamiliar taxa. Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.