NIFA PNW Region Water Quality Program logo

Winter 2009
PNWWATER 148
Changing Public Behavior:

Increasing Citizen Involvement Using Target
Audience Information

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The Pacific Northwest Regional Water Quality Program sponsored a pilot workshop on “Changing Public Behavior” on September 24, 2008 at the Washington State University Research and Extension Center. This workshop was part of the Changing Public Behavior National Facilitation Project to improve citizen involvement in environmental stewardship. It was one of several national pilot workshops led by the University of Wisconsin Extension that is testing innovative techniques and resources for building educator skills.

Onsite classroom in Water Outreach Education ProjectDuring the workshop, Extension educators focused on current research, theories, and approaches to increasing citizen involvement including:

  • Planning to change public behavior
  • Analysing a situation
  • Identifying target audiences
  • Social assessment tools and uses
  • Selecting target behaviors and outreach techniques
  • Participatory actions to change public behavior
  • Water Outreach web site resources
  • Monitor

A pre-workshop needs assessment of workshop participants indicated that participants were adults who were educating volunteers, landowners, homeowners, government agencies, and students in their communities. Participants wanted to focus on water management topics including landscape management, lawn care, pesticide and fertilizer reduction, stormwater runoff, riparian restoration, home and garden water conservation, and waste management. The highest interest was in developing their social assessment and educator skills in the areas of: 1) selecting and applying a data gathering or social assessment procedure, 2) initiating a dialogue with target audiences and stakeholders, 3) using target audience information to assess the potential for behavior change, 4) developing and implementing outreach activities that influence behaviors, and 5) monitoring, evaluating, and sharing results.

University of Wisconsin workshop leaders introduced the National Extension Water Outreach Education Project. This Water Outreach Education Project is a collaboration of USDA NIFA and other public and private clean and safe water partners interested in answering the question: “Education and communication are important environmental management tools, but how do we do it well?” Whether planning a new outreach effort or revitalizing an existing one, incorporating best education practices (BEPs) into water management strategies is critical for achieving success. Extensive efforts have been put in to developing resources for educators on The Water Outreach web site at: http://wateroutreach.uwex.edu.

Washington State University logo University of Idaho logo Oregon State University logo University of Alaska Fairbanks logo Northwest Indian College logo Environmental Protection Agency logo USDA-NIFA logo

Pacific Northwest Regional Water
Quality Coordination Project
Partners

Land Grant Universities
Alaska
Cooperative Extension Service
Contact Fred Sorensen:
907-786-6311
http://www.uaf.edu/ces/water/
University Publications:
http://www.alaska.edu/uaf/ces/publications/

Idaho
University of Idaho
Cooperative Extension System
Contact Bob Mahler: 208-885-7025
http://www.uidaho.edu/wq/wqhome.html
University Publications:
http://info.ag.uidaho.edu/Catalog/catalog.html

Oregon
Oregon State University
Extension Service
Contact Mike Gamroth: 541-737-3316
http://extension.oregonstate.edu/
University Publications:
http://extension.oregonstate.edu/catalog/

Washington
Washington State University
WSU Extension
Contact Bob Simmons:
360-427-9670 ext. 690
http://wawater.wsu.edu/
University Publications:
http://pubs.wsu.edu/

Northwest Indian College
Contact Charlotte Clausing:
360-392-4319
cclausing@nwic.edu or
http://www.nwic.edu/

Water Resource Research Institutes
Water and Environmental Research
Center (Alaska)
http://www.uaf.edu/water/

Idaho Water Resources
Research Institute
http://www.boise.uidaho.edu/

Institute for Water and Watersheds
(Oregon)
http://water.oregonstate.edu/

State of Washington
Water Research Center
http://www.swwrc.wsu.edu/

Environmental Protection Agency
EPA, Region 10
The Pacific Northwest
http://www.epa.gov/r10earth/

Office of Research and Development,
Corvallis Laboratory
http://www.epa.gov/wed/

For more information contact
Jan Seago at 206-553-0038 or
seago.jan@epa.gov

The Project
Land Grant Universities, Water Research Institutes and EPA Region 10 have formed a partnership to provide research and education to communities about protecting or restoring the quality of water resources. This partnership is being supported in part by the USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA).

Our Goal and Approach
The goal of this Project is to provide leadership for water resources research, education and outreach to help people, industry and governments to prevent and solve current and emerging water quality and quantity problems. The approach to achieving this goal is for the Partners to develop a coordinated regional water quality effort based on, and strengthening, individual state programs.

Our Strengths
The Project promotes regional collaboration by acknowledging existing programs and successful efforts; assessing program gaps; identifying potential issues for cross-agency and private sector collaboration, and developing a clearinghouse of expertise and programs. In addition, the Project establishes or enhances partnerships with federal, state and local environmental and water resource management agencies, such as by placing a University Liaison within the offices of EPA Region 10.

Web site resources help educators to:
  • Connect the situation with the people
  • Choose achievable goals
  • Select relevant outreach techniques
  • Get measurable results
  • Specific educator tools include: 1) Best Education Practices Decision Tree 2) Behavior Change Planning Tool, 3) Logic Model, and 4) Facilitation Skills.

    Research supports that there is a human or social dimension to environmental problems, and that outreach efforts can only be truly successful to the extent that they are geared towards changing those characteristics of communities that are contributing towards problem behaviors. One of the effective approaches to behavior change is through “social marketing.” Social marketing uses marketing principles and techniques to influence target audiences to voluntarily accept, reject, modify, or abandon a behavior for the benefit of individuals, groups, or society as a whole.

    Several very successful Extension programs are based on social marketing techniques, including the Washington State University Extension (WSU) Shore Stewards. WSU Shore Stewards is regionalized to seven counties throughout Puget Sound and conducted a 2007 survey indicating significant behavior changes among participants.

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National Water Quality Program Areas

The four land grant universities in the Pacific Northwest have aligned our water resource extension and research efforts with eight themes of the USDA's National Institute of Food and Agriculture.

  1. Animal Waste Management
  2. Drinking Water and Human Health
  3. Environmental Restoration
  4. Nutrient and Pesticide Management
  5. Pollution Assessment and Prevention
  6. Watershed Management
  7. Water Conservation and Agricultural Water Management
  8. Water Policy and Economics
This material is based upon work supported by the
National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U. S. Department of Agriculture,
under Agreement No 2008-51130-4734.

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Download the informational PDF flyer here

A cooperative program consisting of the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture
and
the Land Grant Colleges and Universities.

- a Regionally-Based National Network -

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USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture
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NIFA National Water Quality Program

This material is based upon work supported by the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under Agreement No. 2008-51130-04734.

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page last modified on January 15, 2009

NIFA PNW Regional Water Quality Program