Using a social‐ecological macrosystems framework to understand how human activities alter ecological synchrony

Abstract Different aspects of ecological systems, biotic or abiotic, often fluctuate in coordinated patterns over space and time. Such high concordance between ecological processes is often referred to as ecological synchrony. Human activities, including and beyond climate change, have the potential to alter ecological synchrony by disrupting or enhancing existing synchrony. However, most studies have focused on single scales, limiting our understanding of how human activities alter ecological synchrony across spatial, temporal and organizational scales. With a social‐ecological macrosystems framework, we review how human activities, particularly beyond climate change, alter ecological synchrony from the ecosystem level to the population level. For each level, we present a case study that characterizes the roles of human agents in synchrony using data from large‐scale observations. We found that human activities alter ecological synchrony through interactions among drivers on multiple scales, often disrupting synchrony, but that adaptive management can maintain or restore synchrony. Human activities potentially modify cascades of synchrony through cross‐scale interactions and cross‐scale emergence. Finally, we recommend a set of questions to facilitate the explicit consideration of ecological synchrony as a target in sustainable management. Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.