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Flip to reveal answersState two reasons humans have a strong impact on ecosystems.
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All 15 Flashcards — Human impact on ecosystems
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Question
State two reasons humans have a strong impact on ecosystems.
Answer
Human population growth and high resource consumption, combined with technology and global trade, allow rapid and large-scale environmental change.
💡 Hint
Population + technology/trade
Question
State the key idea linking human activity and biodiversity.
Answer
Human activities often change ecosystems rapidly and commonly reduce biodiversity.
💡 Hint
Rapid change reduces biodiversity
Question
Explain how habitat destruction disrupts food webs.
Answer
It removes producers and habitat, reducing energy entry into the food web and lowering the number of consumers the system can support.
💡 Hint
Removes producers/energy entry
Question
Explain how overexploitation disrupts energy transfer between trophic levels.
Answer
Removing organisms faster than they can be replaced breaks feeding links, reduces prey availability, and can trigger trophic cascades.
💡 Hint
Removes key links
Question
Explain why human impacts are often described as fast, widespread and long-lasting.
Answer
Humans can change environments over years using machinery and infrastructure, act across regions via global supply chains, and cause damage that takes decades or centuries to recover.
💡 Hint
Speed + scale + persistence
Question
State the common exam structure for human impact explanations.
Answer
Link the activity to the ecosystem change, then state the effect on biodiversity and/or energy flow in food webs.
💡 Hint
Activity → change → impact
Question
Explain one way pollution weakens food webs.
Answer
Pollution can reduce survival, growth, or reproduction of organisms, so less usable energy is passed to higher trophic levels.
💡 Hint
Lower survival/energy transfer
Question
Define biodiversity.
Answer
Biodiversity is the variety of life, including diversity of species, habitats, and genetic diversity within species.
💡 Hint
Species + habitat + genetic
Question
Explain how habitat destruction affects energy flow.
Answer
By reducing producer biomass and habitat, less energy enters food webs and fewer consumers can be supported.
💡 Hint
Less producer energy
Question
Explain the general link between human activity and ecosystem stability.
Answer
Human activities often reduce biodiversity and simplify food webs, which lowers resilience and makes ecosystems less able to recover from disturbances.
💡 Hint
Lower biodiversity → lower resilience
Question
Explain how overexploitation can cause wider ecosystem change.
Answer
Removing key species can alter population sizes of other trophic levels and trigger trophic cascades, changing food web structure.
💡 Hint
Trophic cascades
Question
Distinguish between direct and indirect human impacts on food webs.
Answer
Direct impacts remove organisms or energy entry (e.g., habitat loss, overharvesting, pollution); indirect impacts change conditions or interactions (e.g., invasive species, climate change).
💡 Hint
Remove vs change conditions
Question
State three core direct human impacts on food webs.
Answer
Habitat destruction, overexploitation, and pollution.
💡 Hint
Destruction, overuse, pollution
Question
Describe one pathway by which global trade can affect ecosystems.
Answer
Global trade can introduce invasive species and spread pollutants rapidly, altering species interactions and energy flow in food webs.
💡 Hint
Invasives/pollution spread
Question
Explain one way pollution can affect humans through food webs.
Answer
Toxins can bioaccumulate in organisms and biomagnify up food chains, increasing exposure and health risk for humans as top consumers.
💡 Hint
Biomagnification
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