This study explores the potential of Minecraft as a game-based platform to engage youth, and particularly NEET youth, in urban planning discussions.

Methodology: An exploratory qualitative case study was done in collaboration with a Swedish municipality, using observations of modded Minecraft play sessions, interviews, and ethnographic data from an internship program.

Findings: Our data collection led us to identify four themes: (i) Minecraft Enables, the game supports visualization of planning ideas; (Ii) Minecraft Skills Enable, familiarity with the game facilitates participation; (iii) Preferences and Norms, personal ideals shape design choices; and (iv) Understanding Needs, limited awareness of urban functions constrains meaningful engagement.

Originality: Unlike prior studies focusing on children or general youth, this research examines NEET youth as a hard-to-reach group and positions Minecraft as a boundary object for participatory planning rather than a formal planning tool.

Contribution: This study contributes insight into the use of Minecraft in participatory planning with NEET youth, a rarely studied group in serious games literature and game-based approaches.

Pursuing replicability — independent evidence for previous claims — is important for creating generalizable knowledge. Here we attempted replications of 274 claims of positive results from 164 quantitative papers published from 2009 to 2018 in 54 journals in the social and behavioural sciences. Replications were high powered on average to detect the original effect size (median of 99.6%), used original materials when relevant and available, and were peer reviewed in advance through a standardized internal protocol. Replications showed statistically significant results in the original pattern for 151 of 274 claims (55.1% (95% confidence interval (CI) 49.2–60.9%)) and for 80.8 of 164 papers (49.3% (95% CI 43.8–54.7%)), weighed for replicating multiple claims per paper. We observed modest variation in replication rates across disciplines (42.5–63.1%), although some estimates had high uncertainty. The median Pearson’s r effect size was 0.25 (95% CI 0.21–0.27) for original studies and 0.10 (95% CI 0.09–0.13) for replication studies, an 82.4% (95% CI 67.8–88.2%) reduction in shared variance. Thirteen methods for evaluating replication success provided estimates ranging from 28.6% to 74.8% (median of 49.3%). Some decline in effect size and significance is expected based on power to detect original effects and regression to the mean because we replicated only positive results. We observe that challenges for replicability extend across social–behavioural sciences, illustrating the importance of identifying conditions that promote or inhibit replicability.

The inclusion of less represented voices in spatial planning is increasingly important, especially regarding how practitioners engage young people, that is a social group long been marginalised in city-making. This paper examines the potential of Photovoice as a tool for gathering insights into places that youth value or dislike. In collaboration with a Swedish municipality, nine young people participated over three weeks in an activity that led to a public exhibition. This study discusses how methods centred on visualisations of the city can strengthen participatory planning, amplifying youth voices, and integrating both the aesthetic and representational value of photos into change-making processes.

Achieving inclusive urban environments requires addressing systemic exclusion of young people. This paper introduces the concept of the "patronizing city" to explain how adult-centrism shapes political, social, and spatial domains of urban life. This paper describes an analytical framework linking governance, institutional practices, and built environments to adult-centered planning. Through illustrative cases, it advances debate on inclusion, spatial justice, and equity as critical dimensions of urban sustainability.

Wetlands are crucial for sustainable cities, providing key ecosystem services, including aesthetic quality. Effective management requires understanding residents’ preferences and socio-demographic differences in aesthetic perception. Furthermore, it is essential to understand how the composition and arrangement of landscapes influence their aesthetic perception. In this study, we report on research examining how different age and gender groups of residents perceive the aesthetics of selected urban wetlands and identify visual landscape indicators of aesthetic preferences using ecological metrics of composition and spatial configuration. The study applies analysis of photographs of representative wetlands in the Stockholm region, using an online survey and analysis in GIS. The results demonstrate that there are differences in aesthetic perception across age and gender groups, but the judgement of the most aesthetically preferable and unpreferable landscapes is similar among all age and gender groups. Moreover, the results show that urban wetlands with higher levels of spatial complexity, fragmentation and openness for views are perceived as the most beautiful. The results of the study contribute valuable insights into interdisciplinary research by bridging the gaps between biological and social sciences. They can be used in practice for the analysis and prediction of public opinion in urban planning and management.

Understanding the links between biodiversity and human aesthetic perception is vital for designing favourable urban environments and aligning conservation goals with well-being agendas. Despite evidence supporting the preference for beautiful and biodiverse landscapes, inconsistencies exist. This study aims to review the empirical literature on aesthetic perception and biodiversity research in urban settings and identify key methodological challenges in that area of study. The method used is a systematic mapping. The results revealed a lack of a unified methodology for operationalizing the concepts of biodiversity and aesthetic perception, as well as a shortage of standardized, evidence-based statistical procedures. These gaps hinder the systematic analysis of the relationship between biodiversity and perception and contribute to the incompatibility of biodiversity and perception levels. We propose strategies to address these challenges. This review aims to advance the integration of aesthetics and biodiversity science at the methodological level.

This study investigates decision support within the European geographical area. A total of 21 tools have been analysed leading to the identification of a few emerging trends. Predominantly concentrated in the northern part of Europe, these tools aim to assist urban planners in different ways. Findings reveal issues with tools accessibility and a rather weak focus on hard-to-reach groups, including youth. This study underscores the importance of addressing these gaps to ensure inclusivity and effective engagement. Additionally, the study finds a prevailing emphasis on advanced Information and Communication Technology techniques over qualitative data representation, which poses certain limitations to informed decision-making.

Children and youth are increasingly recognized as a stakeholder group that needs to be involved in all planning processes affecting their living environments, such as urban playgrounds. Schoolyards and public playgrounds, as key spaces embedded in the everyday geographies of children, offer a promising site for child-friendly nature-based solutions to counter social and environmental challenges, including health challenges, urban heat stress, and lack of safety for outdoor play. However, greening a city inclusively with children is challenging, and only recently have most European cities begun to explore this. Here, we analyze planning processes for inclusive greening of urban playgrounds and schoolyards in two European cities, Barcelona (Spain) and Utrecht (the Netherlands). Results show inclusive planning with children is challenging due to planning traditions constraining participation, narrow views of non-experts on children's contributions, and a limited understanding of children's agency. In addition, we show that the type of planning affects inclusivity, flexibility, and distributive justice of these playgrounds. Exploring inclusive planning of playgrounds directs our attention to child-friendly urban planning, which goes beyond simply providing playgrounds. It is also about making schools and playgrounds part of the environmental and social transformation of cities and making children part of their planning.

Recognising the aesthetic attributes of urban wetlands and lakes is crucial for guiding their sustainable management, as it fosters social motivation, which in turn contributes to the preservation of water ecosystems. Systematic assessments of landscape aesthetic quality based on visual indicators become essential for urban planning and design. This study focuses on the analysis of visual complexity as a key concept of the aesthetic quality of urban wetlands and lakes in the Stockholm area using indicators of visual quality. It also aims to enhance ecologically oriented landscape aesthetics by investigating how indicators of visual quality correlate with biodiversity parameters. The study employs landscape structure analysis combined with plant diversity analysis, applying a set of aerial photo-based and landscape photo-based indicators. The methodology used included GIS analysis of landscape photos and orthophotos, the identification of landscape metrics in FRAGSTATS, the selection of indices and visual indicators, plant species richness analysis, the evaluation of landscape structure using multivariate canonical analysis and assessment of the relationship between spatial landscape structure using mixed-effects modelling. The novelty of this study lies in introducing new indicators of visual complexity and in exploring the link between visual and ecological complexity in urban wetlands and lakes. The results showed: 1. that the analyzed canonical axes explained 17-50 % of the variation and were correlated with landscape metrics that serve as indicators of shape, aggregation, and edge contrast, suggesting that these metrics could be potential objective indicators of visual complexity; 2. that the effect of edge contrast was consistent but the effect of the index of patch isolation was different in different data sources; 3. and that patch elongation was negatively associated with Shannon diversity, suggesting that it is an integrative metric linking visual and ecological complexity. The results highlight the importance of integrating visual and ecological complexity indicators into monitoring programs and decision-making for managing urban green-blue infrastructure, promoting effective governance, preventing wetland degradation, and supporting participatory discussions for shared understanding.

This study explores the role of young people in urban planning through the lens of procedural justice, focusing on their engagement and participation in research seeking to further youth use and perception of public space. Conducted in Huddinge Municipality, Sweden, the research involved youth as co-researchers in participatory mapping exercises to document their spatial preferences and experiences. Findings highlight the importance of inclusive urban planning that recognizes young people as legitimate stakeholders. Liked spaces were often those that supported social interaction, physical activity, and autonomy, while disliked spaces in the municipality were those the young respondents associate with fear and feelings of discomfort. This study casts a perspective on the need for planning practices that accommodate diverse youth perspectives and promote equitable access to public spaces. Despite challenges in institutional uptake, the research demonstrates the potential of youth participatory methods to inform our understanding and practice for advancing towards more just and responsive urban governance. This work contributes to ongoing debates on spatial justice and the inclusion of marginalized groups in urban decision-making.