President, OpinionWorks, LLC Board Chair, Watershed Stewards Academy Behavior Change 101 December 1, 2016 Steve Raabe President, OpinionWorks, LLC Board Chair, Watershed Stewards Academy

Behavior Change 101 Tonight’s Objectives Understand Basic Principles of Behavior Change Know How to Apply the Social Science See Where This Fits into Baywide Restoration Effort Understand Anne Arundel County Take It Down to the Community Level

OpinionWorks Credentials Measure perceptions, behaviors Random samples, focus groups The Baltimore Sun polling University of Delaware Ag/Residential response to Water Fee Chesapeake Bay Trust Extensive work assessing stewardship City of Dayton, Ohio Comprehensive survey of resident attitudes West Virginia Department of Health Barriers to cancer screening for low-income women Virginia Cooperative Extension Testing affinity for a sustainable lawn care program

Behavior Change Starts with Listening Behavior Change

Research Tools Random Sample Telephone Survey 2,001 randomly selected adults statewide ± 2.2% maximum sampling error, 95% confidence Fielded Dec 2015 – Jan 2016 Supervised, live interviewers; landline and cell 18-minute interview (!) on average Deep look at attitudes Update surveys conducted 2008, 2010

Baywide survey tool to help choose the best behavior Research Tools Online Survey www.BaySurvey.org Baywide survey tool to help choose the best behavior for a local watershed.

Research Tools Focus Groups 75- to 120-minute sessions Professionally facilitated Test: Attitudes, Perceptions Expectations, Barriers Messages, Outreach Techniques

Attitudes about Bay Restoration

Attitudes about Bay Restoration Level of Concern about Problems Maryland Very Serious + Somewhat Serious Problem Climate change has risen slightly relative to other concerns since 2010. “Do you consider each of the following to be a very serious problem, somewhat serious problem, not much of a problem, or not a problem at all?”

Attitudes about Bay Restoration Water Protection Ranks High Maryland 17% Low Priority 44% High Priority Dec 2010: 44% High, 13% Low Nov 2008 49% High, 12% Low “If you were to consider all the issues and challenges facing Maryland today, where would (A/B split): [the health of our local waters/pollution in our local waters] rank on that priority list for you?”

Attitudes about Bay Restoration Why is Water Protection so Important? “Water = Life”

Attitudes about Bay Restoration Still Interested in Hearing about the Bay? Maryland “Compared to a few years ago, would you say you are (randomize): [more interested, less interested, (or) just as interested] today in hearing about the health of the Chesapeake Bay?”

Attitudes about Bay Restoration Perceptions of One’s Own Impact Maryland Perception: Only 26% believe they are contributing meaningfully to water pollution. “Now let’s talk for a minute about what causes water pollution. When it comes to your own impact, do you think you are contributing to water pollution a great deal, somewhat, a little bit, or not at all?”

Attitudes about Bay Restoration Who Is Doing Enough to Reduce Pollution Maryland “Maryland is working to reduce water pollution from all sources. Do you think {actor} (rotate): [is/are doing enough (or) should do more than it does/you do today] to reduce pollution to Maryland waters and the Bay?”

Attitudes about Bay Restoration Can Water Pollution be Fixed? Maryland The Key to Engagement and Behavior Change Dec 2010: 85% Nov 2008: 89% “When you think about pollution in our local waters, do you think the problem can be fixed or is it too difficult?”

Understanding Anne Arundel County

Understanding Anne Arundel County Environmentally-Minded State Avg: 3.39 Anne Arundel Avg: 3.46 “On a scale of 1 to 5 where 5 is a strong environmentalist, 3 is average, and 1 is not an environmentalist at all, where would you put yourself?” (Oct 2014)

Understanding Anne Arundel County Top Environmental Concerns Total 95% Very Serious Somewhat Serious Total Water pollution in rivers, streams, Chesapeake Bay 58% 37% 95% Loss of natural habitat, such as wetlands and forests 57% 31% 88% Air pollution 36% 47% 82% Sprawl or poorly planned growth and development 19% 76% Contaminants in your drinking water or food 39% 26% 65% Global warming or climate change 33% 12% 45% Landfills, incinerators, hazardous waste sites in or near your neighborhood 28% 23% 51% Lead paint or other toxins in your home 30% 14% 44% “Do you consider each of the following to be a very serious problem, somewhat serious problem, not much of a problem, or not a problem at all?” (Dec 2010)

Engaging the Public in Stewardship Contact with the Outdoors & Water? Anne Arundel County Frequently Occasionally Total vs. State Picnic or walk in a public park or neighborhood 49% 33% 82% + 3% Eat fish or seafood out of the Bay or local rivers 28% 46% 74% + 11% Garden at home or in a community garden 34% 62% + 5% Bird watch 22% 15% 37% --- Fish or crab* 13% 20% – 1% Swim in any natural waters besides the ocean* 19% 32% Canoe, kayak, sail, or power boat* 8% 21% 29% + 4% Hike or camp in an undeveloped area 9% 18% 27% – 2% Hunt 4% 7% 11% + 2% *Frequent water contact 24% *Frequent or occasional water contact 52% “Please tell me how often you do any of these things using the scale frequently, occasionally, rarely, or never.” (Dec 2010)

The Chesapeake Bay

Chesapeake Bay Watershed Agreement 10 broad goals for Bay restoration

Citizen Stewardship Outcome “Increase the number and diversity of trained and mobilized citizen volunteers with the knowledge and skills needed to enhance the health of their local watersheds.”

Citizen Stewardship Framework Increasing citizen actions for watershed health Knowledge & skills Community Leaders/ Champions Mobilize/Increase Volunteerism/ Collective Community Action Amy/Jamie Individual Citizen Actions and Behaviors Increasingly Environmentally Literate Population (Elit Goal)

Why is this outcome important? It is the people part of the new Bay Agreement Restoration actions must be widespread-- a thousand cuts/a thousand solutions. Local government needs support from its residents to act. Many other outcomes and management strategies also rely on broad grass roots action. This has not been a direct emphasis of the Chesapeake Bay Program in the past. Amy/Kristin

Photos Courtesy Chesapeake Bay Program STEWARDSHIP INDICATOR Transition to Steve

Stewardship Behavior Measurement Criteria Involves individual decision-making Is repetitive and can be tracked over time Can be broadly adopted Not just by experts Not pre-emergent Has an impact on water health And/or will engage the public

Citizen Stewardship Index Pilot Sampling Methodology   Pilot Program Feb 2016 N=2,000 DC 402 (±4.9%) MD 400 (±4.9%) PA 398 (±4.9%) VA WV 199 (±6.9%) NY 101 (±9.8%) DE 100 (±9.8%) 23 days in field 13-minute interview 43% cell/57% landline

10 “Threshold” Behaviors (19 Total Behaviors Measured) Conservation landscaping Rain garden installed Septic system pumped out Planted a tree Rain barrel connected and emptied Conserve water at home Pick up and dispose of pet waste Pick up litter Fertilizer use Herbicide use

Top Performing Behaviors (Scaled) Pilot Citizen Stewardship Indicator Weighted Data: (4/12/2016) Top Performing Behaviors (Scaled)

Second Tier Behaviors (Scaled) Pilot Citizen Stewardship Indicator Weighted Data: (4/12/2016) Second Tier Behaviors (Scaled)

Performance of Behaviors (Yes/No) Pilot Citizen Stewardship Indicator Weighted Data: (4/12/2016) Performance of Behaviors (Yes/No)

Likelihood to Change Behavior

Pilot Citizen Stewardship Indicator Weighted Data: (4/12/2016) Behaviors Most Susceptible to Change Asked Only of Those Not Performing the Desired Behavior Today Now I would like to ask you about a few of those actions again. Looking forward over the next year or so, how likely are you to do each of these things using the scale (rotate high to low/low to high): [very likely, somewhat likely, (or) not likely].

Pilot Citizen Stewardship Indicator Weighted Data: (4/12/2016) Behaviors Least Susceptible to Change Asked Only of Those Not Performing the Desired Behavior Today Now I would like to ask you about a few of those actions again. Looking forward over the next year or so, how likely are you to do each of these things using the scale (rotate high to low/low to high): [very likely, somewhat likely, (or) not likely].

Pilot Citizen Stewardship Indicator Weighted Data: (3/1/2016) I want to do more to help make local waters healthier. Level of Agreement 74% agree

Pilot Citizen Stewardship Indicator Weighted Data: (3/1/2016) If I wanted to volunteer to help the natural environment locally, I would know how to do that. Level of Agreement 54% agree Only 40% can name a local organization that is working to address water pollution.

Attitudes about Bay Restoration My Own Action Would Make a Difference? Maryland “If someone asked you to volunteer to help address water pollution, do you think your action would actually make a difference or not really make a difference for the problem of water pollution?”

“If I knew what to do to help clean up local waters, I would do a lot more.”

Influencing Behavior: Community Based Social Marketing

Resistant 16% Credit: Nancy R. Lee, University of Washington & Puget Sound Partnership Adapted from Everett Rogers, Jay Kassirer, Mike Rothschild, Dave Ward, Kristen Cooley

Credit: Nancy R. Lee, University of Washington & Puget Sound Partnership Adapted from Everett Rogers, Jay Kassirer, Mike Rothschild, Dave Ward, Kristen Cooley

Traditional Public Education Websites Brochures Community meetings Compulsory Actions Regulations Fees & Fines Legal action Credit: Nancy R. Lee, University of Washington & Puget Sound Partnership Adapted from Everett Rogers, Jay Kassirer, Mike Rothschild, Dave Ward, Kristen Cooley

Too many choices = Overwhelmed Too many choices = Inaction Engaging the Public in Stewardship Show Me What I Can Do One or two actions, not 10! Too many choices = Overwhelmed Too many choices = Inaction Show the “five dollar action” the average person can take, not just costly actions.

The Social Marketing Process Reaching the Help Me Group Know your campaign’s purpose and focus Pinpoint your target audience Identify the specific behavior you want the audience to take Assess the barriers to the action Find the benefits and motivators that will overcome those barriers

The Social Marketing Process Reaching the Help Me Group Refine your messages, incentives, and tools, and determine where and how you will deliver them to the target audience Product: Social Marketing Tools, Benefits Place: Convenience for the Audience Price: Incentives, Rebates Promotion: Messages, Delivery Channels Evaluate and measure your progress

Social Marketing Tools Reaching the Help Me Group Example Tool: Prompts Peel-off sticker Refrigerator magnet

Example Tool: Pledge “Free Upgrade” A/B Test: Flooding Water quality 50% of homes visited signed the pledge

Case Study: To increase the adoption of wetlands restoration on agricultural lands in keeping with the Chesapeake Bay Agreement This case study relates to the wetlands outcome of the Chesapeake Bay Agreement.

The research was generally focused in areas that the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation has previously identified as offering high potential for wetlands adoption. Ultimately, this work was focused in Juniata, York, and Lancaster Counties in Pennsylvania; and Caroline, Kent, Talbot, Dorchester, Somerset, Wicomico, and Worcester Counties in Maryland.

“Downstream” Audience: Landowner Attitudes Towards Wetland Restoration Target Audience “Downstream” Audience: Agricultural landowners 40+ acres Not enrolled in wetlands restoration program Targeted counties Coastal plain to Piedmont Good infrastructure and other efforts in place The project identified a “downstream” or decision-making audience of agricultural landowners. The focus of this research was landowners of 40 or more acres who are not presently enrolled in a wetlands restoration program, and who live in counties that have an infrastructure in place that would allow for effective education and marketing of the wetlands programs that are available. The targeted counties ranged from the coastal plain of Delmarva to the Piedmont of Central Pennsylvania.

“Midstream” Audience: Landowner Attitudes Towards Wetland Restoration Target Audience “Midstream” Audience: Service providers to the agricultural landowners County agricultural service centers Early in the process, the research identified an important “midstream” audience, consisting of technical assistance providers typically located in county agricultural service centers, and which enjoy high trust from the downstream landowner audience.

Randomly-selected agricultural landowners in targeted counties Landowner Attitudes Towards Wetland Restoration Landowner Survey Methodology Randomly-selected agricultural landowners in targeted counties Survey conducted by mail/phone (Aug 2015) Survey packet mailed Phone calls to non-responders 409 survey responses The research was conducted in two phases. First, a survey was conducted in August 2015 among agricultural landowners randomly selected from within the targeted counties. Wetlands program non-participant lists were not available to researchers, so landowners were included in the survey regardless of their knowledge or participation in wetlands programs. A survey packet consisting of a cover letter and printed questionnaire was mailed, with a postage paid mail-back mechanism included, as well as a URL where landowners could complete the survey online if they preferred. Telephone calls were subsequently made to non-responders, with the survey was administered by telephone. A total of 409 landowners took part in the survey through these methods.

Landowner Attitudes Towards Wetland Restoration Landowner Focus Groups 4 Locations (Sep, Nov 2015) Juniata County, PA Lancaster/York Counties, PA Mid-Shore, MD Lower Shore, MD 120-minute sessions, professionally facilitated Tested: Attitudes, Perceptions Expectations, Barriers Messages, Outreach Techniques Subsequently, four focus groups were conducted between September and November 2015. They ranged from Juniata County in the Central Pennsylvania Piedmont down to the lower Eastern Shore (Salisbury) in Maryland. Six to eight landowners participated in each group, which was a probing discussion of relevant issues, and designed to identify the motivators and incentives that could overcome the barriers to enrolling in wetlands programs. Each session was facilitated by a trained moderator who is skilled at leading such a discussion and helping the group pinpoint key observations.

Landowner Attitudes Towards Wetland Restoration Barriers to Adopting Wetlands Programs Landowners do not know how to start the process, or where to go for information. Mistrust of government agencies. Loss of control over what happens on my land. Strong preference for peer-to-peer validation, at the expense of many other messengers. Significant privacy concerns. Smaller farms challenged because they do not want to give up limited tillable land. “Wetland” is not a positive term, yet it is used extensively in program literature and parlance. Heavy reliance on postal communication, which introduces limitations on outreach. Very busy people; hard to reach. Don’t want people showing up on their land unannounced. Perceived inflexibility of these programs. Fear that the land will be out of production forever; may affect future sale price or next generation of landowners. Mosquitos. Loss of income. Variability of crop prices introduces uncertainty. Landowners’ prevailing view that all land must be “useful.” Landowners are not being approached with this information. Very uneven knowledge about program availability, and uneven commitment to selling these programs, among local ag service providers and other advocates. Through this research, we learned of many barriers to enrollment in wetlands programs. These included lack of knowledge, significant privacy concerns and mistrust of government, misperceptions and negative impressions of wetlands, tremendous concerns for loss of flexibility and control over one’s property, loss of tillable acreage, and a constant uncertainty of future commodity prices, which makes the cost-benefit calculation for these programs extremely difficult in the out years. Barriers are many and easy to identify.

Lack of information/advocacy Privacy and trust concerns Landowner Attitudes Towards Wetland Restoration Barriers to Adopting Wetlands Programs Lack of information/advocacy Privacy and trust concerns Financial uncertainty Extreme need for flexibility Audience is hard to reach Boiling down this long list of barriers into broad topics, these five categories suggest themselves. The audience lacks deep awareness of wetlands-specific programs, despite widespread familiarity with one program - CREP. Furthermore and importantly, in the early phases of this research it became clear that some in the midstream audience of agricultural service providers also lack knowledge of the program specifics, and therefore are not in a position to market the programs effectively. The landowner audience voiced strong and repeated concerns for their privacy, and expressed general cynicism about the public sector. They would not welcome overtures from messengers they did not already know and trust. The financial uncertainty of future rental payments given the variability of commodity prices undermines the appeal of the financial benefit of these programs. Landowners want flexibility. They want to control what happens on their land in the immediate term, and do not want to lock themselves into a long-term contract that may burden their heirs or reduce the market value of their land. Importantly, this is a busy audience and hard to reach. By and large, most were not digitally inclined and not very phone responsive. Traditional mail and in-person contact remain the best ways to interact with this audience, which can make marketing and outreach more cumbersome and expensive.

Water impairment (Delmarva) Erosion/Flash flooding (PA) Landowner Attitudes Towards Wetland Restoration Underlying Concerns of the Audience Water impairment (Delmarva) Erosion/Flash flooding (PA) Encroaching development The focus group discussion provided clues to motivators that could help overcome these barriers. In Delmarva, landowners expressed strong concern for water quality in the creeks and streams surrounding their properties and in their groundwater. They understood that wetlands can play a role in helping restore natural waters around their property. In Pennsylvania, concerns were much more oriented towards erosion and flash flooding. In addition to erosion, Pennsylvania landowners focused on other signs of stream health such as presence of fish and water temperature. Encroaching development was a significant concern in both the Lancaster/York and the Mid-Shore focus groups. There, wetlands restoration was seen by some as a way to buffer against sprawling development, perhaps saving their own farm for future generations.

Level of Trust in Information 1-5 scale; Top 8 The survey contributed some refined understanding of the most trusted messengers. A total of 15 entities that might provide information about wetlands were tested on a 1 to 5 scale of trust, with 5 being highest. Here, the top eight are shown. As is often the case, family members rank highest. Just below them are the agricultural agencies that farmers tend to see as their sounding boards and advocates, and which are generally found in the county agricultural services office. Ducks Unlimited also made the top tier. “Please indicate how much you would trust information from each of these organizations and individuals about preservation and restoration of natural areas on your land.” (5-point scale of trust.)

Level of Trust in Information 1-5 scale; Second Tier Non-agricultural entities, private sector parties, and environmental organizations make up the lower tier. “Please indicate how much you would trust information from each of these organizations and individuals about preservation and restoration of natural areas on your land.” (5-point scale of trust.)

1. Water Quality/Stream Health 2. Wildlife/Waterfowl Habitat Landowner Attitudes Towards Wetland Restoration Core Benefits 1. Water Quality/Stream Health Erosion Control (PA) 2. Wildlife/Waterfowl Habitat Hunting/Hunting Leases (MD) 3. Hedge against Encroachment At its core, this effort can be built around landowners’ strong concern for water quality. In Pennsylvania, this can take the specific added dimension of addressing flash flooding and erosion control. Wildlife habitat and the potential for hunting leases is a powerful motivator in Maryland, and to a lesser extent upstream in Pennsylvania. In areas that have development threat, the hedge against the encroachment of future development is an additional motivator for some. Note that despite their importance, rental payments are not presented as a core benefit because of the uncertainty of future commodity prices, which weighs on the decision-making process of many agricultural landowners, as was made clear in the focus groups.

This conversation is critical to: Assessing alternatives Landowner Attitudes Towards Wetland Restoration Critical Connection Rural Landowner Trusted Specialist This conversation is critical to: Building comfort Answering questions Assessing alternatives Critical to the success of the outreach effort is engaging the trusted midstream audience, and fostering direct, personal conversations between landowners and their local agricultural specialists. This may require some training for the specialists to bring them up-to-speed on the wetlands programs that are available in their county, and to provide them with talking points drawn from the findings of this study.

Key Takeaways Farmers typically want to do their part for water quality. A well-informed social science approach is often most effective in building the bridge. Environmental advocates must think about their issues from an ag perspective. Must respect farmers’ real-life barriers to action Make the environmental action beneficial for them. Understand who has the trust of the ag audience, and equip them to have an informed conversation about the issue. This research suggests that awareness of programs is low, and that wetlands adoption is also hampered by many serious barriers. The community of specialists who could market these programs need basic tools to help them offer and describe these programs, and a coordinated outreach effort is needed to encourage landowners to initiate these conversations. As a next step, the resources must be found to develop and implement this effort on a pilot basis, to determine how successful we can be in increasing program adoption with the right outreach techniques and messengers.

What Have We Learned?