People are more likely to enroll in conservation programmes if their neighbors do, a tendency that should be exploited when it comes to protecting the environment, according to results of a new study.
The research, to be published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) this week, is the first to focus on the phenomenon of social norms in the context of China's conservation efforts, said scientist Jianguo "Jack" Liu of Michigan State University (MSU).
The study focused on a mammoth government initiative called Grain-to-Green that pays Chinese farmers to convert cropland back to forest.
"Much of the marginal cropland in rural communities has been converted from agriculture to forests through the Grain-to-Green Programme, one of the largest 'payment for ecosystem services' programmes in the world," said Alan Tessier, programme director in the National Science Foundation (NSF)'s Division of Environmental Biology.
"Results of this study show that a community's social norms have substantial impacts on the sustainability of these conservation investments."
While money is a key factor in whether people sign up for the voluntary programme, peer pressure also plays a surprisingly large role, Liu said.
"That's the power of social norms," he said. "It's like recycling. If you see your neighbors doing it, you're more likely to do it."
A representative survey of households in China's Wolong Nature Reserve for giant pandas found that both government payments and social norms had "significant impacts" on citizens' intentions of re-enrolling in the Grain to Green programme.
"In other words, people's re-enrollment intentions can be affected by the re-enrollment decisions of their neighbours and tend to conform to the majority," says Liu.
Xiaodong Chen, a doctoral student at MSU and lead author of the paper, said government officials should leverage these social norms along with economic and demographic trends when deciding how to support conservation programmes such as Grain to Green.
"We found that, without considering the social norm factor, conservation payments may not be used efficiently," Chen said.
"But if the government considers social norms as it decides where to invest money, it could obtain more environmental benefits in communities that are supportive of these programmes than in those that aren't."
Co-author and MSU scientist Frank Lupi said: "Simply by taking account of the social norms, more conservation can be obtained from limited conservation budgets."
Also contributing to the study was doctoral student Guangming He.
Funding also was provided by NASA, the National Institutes of Health, MSU's Environmental Research Initiative and the Michigan Agricultural Experiment Station.
The research, to be published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) this week, is the first to focus on the phenomenon of social norms in the context of China's conservation efforts, said scientist Jianguo "Jack" Liu of Michigan State University (MSU).
The study focused on a mammoth government initiative called Grain-to-Green that pays Chinese farmers to convert cropland back to forest.
"Much of the marginal cropland in rural communities has been converted from agriculture to forests through the Grain-to-Green Programme, one of the largest 'payment for ecosystem services' programmes in the world," said Alan Tessier, programme director in the National Science Foundation (NSF)'s Division of Environmental Biology.
"Results of this study show that a community's social norms have substantial impacts on the sustainability of these conservation investments."
While money is a key factor in whether people sign up for the voluntary programme, peer pressure also plays a surprisingly large role, Liu said.
"That's the power of social norms," he said. "It's like recycling. If you see your neighbors doing it, you're more likely to do it."
A representative survey of households in China's Wolong Nature Reserve for giant pandas found that both government payments and social norms had "significant impacts" on citizens' intentions of re-enrolling in the Grain to Green programme.
"In other words, people's re-enrollment intentions can be affected by the re-enrollment decisions of their neighbours and tend to conform to the majority," says Liu.
Xiaodong Chen, a doctoral student at MSU and lead author of the paper, said government officials should leverage these social norms along with economic and demographic trends when deciding how to support conservation programmes such as Grain to Green.
"We found that, without considering the social norm factor, conservation payments may not be used efficiently," Chen said.
"But if the government considers social norms as it decides where to invest money, it could obtain more environmental benefits in communities that are supportive of these programmes than in those that aren't."
Co-author and MSU scientist Frank Lupi said: "Simply by taking account of the social norms, more conservation can be obtained from limited conservation budgets."
Also contributing to the study was doctoral student Guangming He.
Funding also was provided by NASA, the National Institutes of Health, MSU's Environmental Research Initiative and the Michigan Agricultural Experiment Station.
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