Green Scaffolding: Co-creating Models to Enhance Shared Decision-making for Greener Conservation

This paper presents a co-created model designed during the GoGreen project to help promote green thinking and communication in conservation by integrating behavioural insight, user-experience methods and practitioner expertise. Rather than proposing a new conservation process, the model wraps around existing practices – a kind of ‘green scaffolding’ – which acknowledges the varied approaches to conservation and the interconnected decisions shaped by context, infrastructure and individual agency. A practitioner workshop using journey mapping and behavioural reduction revealed recurring characteristics: cyclic processes, the influence of organisational and environmental factors, and the need to navigate both simple and complex tasks. These insights informed a spiral framework, organised by stages and decision levels, that emphasises iterative enquiry, communication and achievable action. The flexible structure helps enable greener outcomes across diverse conservation contexts.