The majority of forestland in the Eastern United States is a mosaic of small landholdings (< 20 ha) where property management is largely uncoordinated. On such landscapes, decentralized, ownership-centric decision-making defines the mix of ecosystem services provided and the landscape patterns present now and in the future. While somewhat effective for less spatially sensitive ecosystem services (e.g., fiber production), this ownership-centric approach is ill suited to spatially sensitive ones (e.g., water quality) and may, in some cases, be detrimental to them (e.g., habitat fragmentation). Improving the ecological and landscape sensitivity of private forest conservation and management is a major challenge facing researchers, practitioners, and policymakers in sustaining forest ecosystems.
Central to unraveling this challenge is a fundamental understanding of how landowners simultaneously fit within their social and bio-physical landscapes. Despite their importance to broader forest sustainability, our collectively understanding of forest landowners has been primarily concerned with individual landowners and/or individual properties. For example, most research surrounding private forest landowners centers on primarily agent-based theories of behavior or decision-making (e.g., rational actor, theory of planned behavior). This perspective is useful in predicting and effecting behavioral change at broad scales, but lacks the specificity needed to address local landscape concerns and/or opportunities. Other studies have begun to unpack the social and ecological connections at landscape scales to provide useful insights and suggestions, but often take case study and/or qualitative approaches and do not adequately separate confounding contextual drivers (e.g., threat of regulation) that make application to other settings with different contexts difficult.
Purpose, Objectives, and Research QuestionsThe purpose of this exploratory research is to formally investigate the social networks of private landowners and the connection of those networks to the bio-physical landscape. Our work will consider the networks of information sources and the specific role played by resource professionals in key land management decisions (i.e., harvest timber from, place conservation easement on the land) that can fundamentally alter/preserve landscape patterns. This study has two
objectives.
- Characterize and compare the egocentric networks that inform landowner decisionmaking related to two land management decisions.
- Place network actors on the bio-physical landscape to explore interactions between social and ecological landscapes.
Based on our objectives and past work, we posit three working research questions.
- From whom do landowners seek information when making decisions about their forestland (RQ1)?
- To what extent does a source's connection to the local bio-physical landscape affect the landowner's assessment of the information the source provides (RQ2)?
- Are network configurations linked to environmental outcomes (i.e., water quality) (RQ2)?
This project combines research from two studies.
Study 1: Easements & Harvesting: In Massachusetts, We will conduct structured interviews with landowners in the study area who recently harvested timber or placed a conservation easement on their property. Interviews will elicit data on information sources to quantitatively evaluate the source's expertise, homophily, etc., and basic background information. Interviewees will also be asked to provide quantitative assessments of the decision and its outcomes. Locational data will be incorporated into a GIS for spatial analysis, while egocentric network data will be analyzed using appropriate egocentric network measures coupled with interviewee and source characteristics.
Study 2: Harvesting & Water Quality: In Wisconsin, we repeat study 1 with landowners who have recently harvested timber and have agreed to participate in the State's Best Management Practices for Water Quality Monitoring Program. In this way, the analysis from study 1 can be linked to the implementation and evaluation of specific practices on the land.
Expected Outcomes- Study 1 is intended to yield useful insights, working hypothesis, and preliminary results toward more in-depth research and act as a "proof of concept" for integrating social network and ecological analyses. We anticipate that our findings will be of interest to the broader research and practitioner communities and will result in 1-2 scholarly articles and at least one conference presentation.
- Study 2 will extend the results of the first study into the realm of actual behavior and environmental outcomes. Academic outcomes are expected (e.g., articles, presentations), but this study will also inform how foresters and other resource professionals understand the implementation of BMPs.
- Findings from both studies will guide on-going planning and delivery and, as appropriate, new outreach programs that reflect the knowledge gained through this and future research.
As these outcomes are realized, we will post results.
