Urban ecological restoration can produce important social benefits in addition to those biophysical improvements traditionally included in the evaluation of restoration success (cf. Table 1). Achieving social benefits requires local people to participate in planning, implementation, and evaluation of restoration. Restoration also provides experimental opportunities to study the interactions between human and non-human components of ecosystems. Existing sociological, psychological, and anthropological literature provide methods for analyzing effects of restoration on adaptive behavior, community structure, values, perceptions, knowledge, and personal efficacy. For example, perceptions could be monitored by annual surveys and plotted on a performance curve (Fig. 1). The maximum increase in benefit would occur as the curve levels off and the system stabilizes. Ideally, stable post-restoration perceptions would be more favorable than the pre-restoration condition.