摘要：Interactions between distant places are increasingly widespread and influential, often leading to unexpectedoutcomes with profound implications for sustainability. Numerous sustainability studies have been conducted within a particularplace with little attention to the impacts of distant interactions on sustainability in multiple places. Although distant forces havebeen studied, they are usually treated as exogenous variables and feedbacks have rarely been considered. To understand andintegrate various distant interactions better, we propose an integrated framework based on telecoupling, an umbrella conceptthat refers to socioeconomic and environmental interactions over distances. The concept of telecoupling is a logical extensionof research on coupled human and natural systems, in which interactions occur within particular geographic locations. Thetelecoupling framework contains five major interrelated components, i.e., coupled human and natural systems, flows, agents,causes, and effects. We illustrate the framework using two examples of distant interactions associated with trade of agriculturalcommodities and invasive species, highlight the implications of the framework, and discuss research needs and approaches tomove research on telecouplings forward. The framework can help to analyze system components and their interrelationships,identify research gaps, detect hidden costs and untapped benefits, provide a useful means to incorporate feedbacks as well astrade-offs and synergies across multiple systems (sending, receiving, and spillover systems), and improve the understanding ofdistant interactions and the effectiveness of policies for socioeconomic and environmental sustainability from local to globallevels
关键词：agents; causes; coupled human-environment systems; coupled human and natural systems; coupled social-;ecological systems; dispersal; distant interactions; effects; feedbacks; flows; globalization; investment; knowledge transfer;migration; socioeconomic and environmental interactions; species invasion; sustainability; technology transfer; teleconnection;telecoupling; trade; transnational land deals; water transfer
