SYSTEMATIC REVIEW article
Front. Hortic.
Sec. Floriculture and Landscapes
This article is part of the Research TopicUrban Horticulture and Urban Gardening as Activities to Increase Local Food Production and Provide Other Ecosystem ServicesView all articles
Environmental and Social Drivers of Urban Garden Biodiversity: a PRISMA-ScR Review
Provisionally accepted
- Korea national arboretum, Pocheon-si, Republic of Korea
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Urban gardens are increasingly recognized as multifunctional green spaces that support biodiversity and contribute to sustainable urban living. This scoping review synthesizes findings from 30 peer-reviewed studies (26 core studies identified through the PRISMA-ScR process and four additional studies from a supplementary update search) published since 2000, selected from an initial pool of 11,900 records retrieved from Web of Science, Scopus, and PubMed, following PRISMA-ScR guidelines. The review explores how environmental and social factors interact to shape biodiversity outcomes in urban gardens across different regions and taxa. Environmental variables—such as garden size, vegetation structure, landscape connectivity, and reduced pollution—were consistently associated with higher species richness and abundance. Simultaneously, social dimensions including gardeners' socioeconomic status, cultural identity, and management practices, significantly influenced species composition and diversity. Together, these factors act complementarily to determine biodiversity potential of urban gardens. Moreover, gardens often reflect the cultural values and motivations of their managers, leading to variations in ecological performance and ecosystem services provided. Thus, urban gardens function as both ecological habitats and space for community participation, education, and cultural expression thereby reinforcing their role as socio-ecological infrastructures. By identifying the key drivers that enhance garden-based biodiversity, this review provides policy-relevant insights for urban planning and garden management strategies can support local ecosystem services. These findings contribute to the growing discourse on urban horticulture and emphasize the potential of gardens as scalable components of sustainable and biodiverse cities.
Keywords: Ecosystem Services2, functional biodiversity5, landscape structure4, urban gardening1, urban sustainability3
Received: 23 Jun 2025; Accepted: 16 Dec 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Park and Jeong. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Miae Jeong
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