IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/uwp/landec/v87y2011iii1p433-452.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Empathy-Conditioned Conservation: “Walking in the Shoes of Others” as a Conservation Farmer

Author

Listed:
  • Robert J. Sheeder
  • Gary D. Lynne

Abstract

Conservation tillage on farms can improve downstream water quality. Using a dual-interests theoretical framework guided by the metaeconomics approach, this paper examines the role of self-interest and shared other-interest in the conservation tillage adoption decision. The data is from a 2007 survey of farmers in the Blue River/Tuttle Creek watershed of Nebraska and Kansas. Logit models show that farmers who temper their pursuit of self-interest with shared other-interest reflecting empathy-sympathy are more likely to adopt conservation tillage. Habit and control also play a role. Farmers pursue a joint and interdependent own-interest and not only self-interest as presumed in microeconomics.

Suggested Citation

  • Robert J. Sheeder & Gary D. Lynne, 2011. "Empathy-Conditioned Conservation: “Walking in the Shoes of Others” as a Conservation Farmer," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 87(3), pages 433-452.
    • Handle: RePEc:uwp:landec:v:87:y:2011:iii:1:p:433-452
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://le.uwpress.org/cgi/reprint/87/3/433
    Download Restriction: A subscripton is required to access pdf files. Pay per article is available.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hayley H. Chouinard & Tobias Paterson & Philip R. Wandschneider & Adrienne M. Ohler, 2008. "Will Farmers Trade Profits for Stewardship? Heterogeneous Motivations for Farm Practice Selection," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 84(1), pages 66-82.
    2. Ajzen, Icek, 1991. "The theory of planned behavior," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 50(2), pages 179-211, December.
    3. Czap, Natalia V. & Czap, Hans J., 2010. "An experimental investigation of revealed environmental concern," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(10), pages 2033-2041, August.
    4. Clark P. Bishop & C. Richard Shumway & Philip R. Wandschneider, 2010. "Agent Heterogeneity in Adoption of Anaerobic Digestion Technology: Integrating Economic, Diffusion, and Behavioral Innovation Theories," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 86(3).
    5. Swedberg, Richard, 1988. "Amitai Etzioni, The Moral Dimension: Toward A New Economics. New York: The Free Press-Collier Macmillan, 1988. xvii, 352 pp, $24.95," Journal of Public Policy, Cambridge University Press, vol. 8(3-4), pages 414-415, July.
    6. Vernon L. Smith, 1998. "The Two Faces of Adam Smith," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 65(1), pages 2-19, July.
    7. Lichtenberg, Erik, 2004. "Cost-Responsiveness of Conservation Practice Adoption: A Revealed Preference Approach," Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Western Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 29(3), pages 1-16, December.
    8. Joseph C. Cooper & Russ W. Keim, 1996. "Incentive Payments to Encourage Farmer Adoption of Water Quality Protection Practices," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 78(1), pages 54-64.
    9. Daniel Kahneman, 2003. "Maps of Bounded Rationality: Psychology for Behavioral Economics," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(5), pages 1449-1475, December.
    10. JunJie Wu & Richard M. Adams & Catherine L. Kling & Katsuya Tanaka, 2004. "From Microlevel Decisions to Landscape Changes: An Assessment of Agricultural Conservation Policies," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 86(1), pages 26-41.
    11. Gary D. Lynne, 1988. "Allocatable Fixed Inputs and Jointness in Agricultural Production: Implications For Economic Modeling: Comment," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 70(4), pages 947-949.
    12. Daniel Kahneman & Peter P. Wakker & Rakesh Sarin, 1997. "Back to Bentham? Explorations of Experienced Utility," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 112(2), pages 375-406.
    13. Hirschman, Albert O., 1985. "Against Parsimony: Three Easy Ways of Complicating some Categories of Economic Discourse," Economics and Philosophy, Cambridge University Press, vol. 1(1), pages 7-21, April.
    14. Cain, Zachary & Lovejoy, Stephen B., 2004. "History and Outlook for Farm Bill Conservation Programs," Choices: The Magazine of Food, Farm, and Resource Issues, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 19(4), pages 1-6.
    15. Christine A. Ervin & David E. Ervin, 1982. "Factors Affecting the Use of Soil Conservation Practices: Hypotheses, Evidence, and Policy Implications," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 58(3), pages 277-292.
    16. Etzioni, Amitai, 1986. "The Case for a Multiple-Utility Conception," Economics and Philosophy, Cambridge University Press, vol. 2(2), pages 159-184, October.
    17. Maybery, Darryl & Crase, Lin & Gullifer, Chris, 2005. "Categorising farming values as economic, conservation and lifestyle," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 26(1), pages 59-72, February.
    18. Luanne Lohr & Timothy A. Park, 1995. "Utility-Consistent Discrete-Continuous Choices in Soil Conservation," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 71(4), pages 474-490.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Jacobson, Sarah, 2014. "Temporal spillovers in land conservation," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 107(PA), pages 366-379.
    2. Villamayor-Tomas, Sergio & Sagebiel, Julian & Rommel, Jens & Olschewski, Roland, 2021. "Types of collective action problems and farmers’ willingness to accept agri-environmental schemes in Switzerland," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 50(C).
    3. Veldstra, Michael D. & Alexander, Corinne E. & Marshall, Maria I., 2014. "To certify or not to certify? Separating the organic production and certification decisions," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 49(P2), pages 429-436.
    4. Wade, Tara & Kurkalova, Lyubov & Secchi, Silvia, 2016. "Modeling Field-Level Conservation Tillage Adoption with Aggregate Choice Data," Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Western Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 41(2), May.
    5. Czap, Natalia V. & Czap, Hans J. & Khachaturyan, Marianna & Lynne, Gary D. & Burbach, Mark, 2012. "Walking in the shoes of others: Experimental testing of dual-interest and empathy in environmental choice," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 41(5), pages 642-653.
    6. Laure Kuhfuss & Raphaële Préget & Sophie Thoyer & Frans P. de Vries & Nick Hanley, 2017. "Nudging Participation and Spatial Agglomeration in Payment for Environmental Service Schemes," Discussion Papers in Environment and Development Economics 2017-11, University of St. Andrews, School of Geography and Sustainable Development.
    7. Kennedy, Stephanie M. & Burbach, Mark E. & Sliwinski, Maggi S., 2016. "Sustainable Grassland Management: An Exploratory Study of Progressive Ranchers in Nebraska," Sustainable Agriculture Research, Canadian Center of Science and Education, vol. 5(2).
    8. Mooney, Daniel F. & Barham, Bradford L., 2013. "What Drives the Adoption of Clean Agricultural Technologies? An Ex Ante Assessment of Sustainable Biofuel Production in Southwestern Wisconsin," 2013 Annual Meeting, August 4-6, 2013, Washington, D.C. 150557, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    9. Jean McGuire & Lois Morton & Alicia Cast, 2013. "Reconstructing the good farmer identity: shifts in farmer identities and farm management practices to improve water quality," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 30(1), pages 57-69, March.
    10. Sulemana, Iddisah & James, Harvey S., 2014. "Farmer identity, ethical attitudes and environmental practices," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 98(C), pages 49-61.
    11. Sutan, Angela & Grolleau, Gilles & Mateu, Guillermo & Vranceanu, Radu, 2018. "“Facta non verba”: An experiment on pledging and giving," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 65(C), pages 1-15.
    12. Kuhfuss, Laure & Preget, Raphaele & Thoyer, Sophie & de Vries, Frans & Hanley, Nick, 2018. "Spatial coordination in Payment for Environmental Service schemes: can we nudge the agglomeration bonus to enhance its effectiveness?," 92nd Annual Conference, April 16-18, 2018, Warwick University, Coventry, UK 273497, Agricultural Economics Society.
    13. Peterson, Hikaru Hanawa & Barkley, Andrew & Chacón-Cascante, Adriana & Kastens, Terry L., 2012. "The Motivation for Organic Grain Farming in the United States: Profits, Lifestyle, or the Environment?," Journal of Agricultural and Applied Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 44(2), pages 137-155, May.
    14. Aaron Thompson & Adam Reimer & Linda Prokopy, 2015. "Farmers’ views of the environment: the influence of competing attitude frames on landscape conservation efforts," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 32(3), pages 385-399, September.
    15. Kuhfuss, Laure & Préget, Raphaële & Thoyer, Sophie & de Vries, Frans P. & Hanley, Nick, 2022. "Enhancing spatial coordination in payment for ecosystem services schemes with non-pecuniary preferences," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 192(C).
    16. Mzoughi, Naoufel, 2014. "Do organic farmers feel happier than conventional ones? An exploratory analysis," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 103(C), pages 38-43.
    17. Wade, Tara & Kurkalova, Lyubov A. & Secchi, Silvia, 2012. "Using the logit model with aggregated choice data in estimation of Iowa corn farmers’ conservation tillage subsidies," 2012 Annual Meeting, August 12-14, 2012, Seattle, Washington 124974, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    18. Gary D Lynne & Natalia V Czap, 2024. "Towards Dual Interest Theory in Metaeconomics," Journal of Interdisciplinary Economics, , vol. 36(1), pages 7-25, January.
    19. Kassoum Ayouba, 2023. "Spatial dependence in production frontier models," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 60(1), pages 21-36, August.
    20. Chouinard, Hayley H. & Wandschneider, Philip R. & Paterson, Tobias, 2016. "Inferences from sparse data: An integrated, meta-utility approach to conservation research," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 122(C), pages 71-78.
    21. Czap, Natalia V. & Czap, Hans J. & Lynne, Gary D. & Burbach, Mark E., 2015. "Walk in my shoes: Nudging for empathy conservation," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 118(C), pages 147-158.
    22. Beretti, Antoine & Figuières, Charles & Grolleau, Gilles, 2013. "Behavioral innovations: The missing capital in sustainable development?," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(C), pages 187-195.
    23. François J Dessart & Jesús Barreiro-Hurlé & René van Bavel, 2019. "Behavioural factors affecting the adoption of sustainable farming practices: a policy-oriented review," European Review of Agricultural Economics, Oxford University Press and the European Agricultural and Applied Economics Publications Foundation, vol. 46(3), pages 417-471.
    24. Danley, Brian, 2019. "Forest owner objectives typologies: Instruments for each owner type or instruments for most owner types?," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 105(C), pages 72-82.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Chouinard, Hayley H. & Wandschneider, Philip R. & Paterson, Tobias, 2016. "Inferences from sparse data: An integrated, meta-utility approach to conservation research," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 122(C), pages 71-78.
    2. Lynne, Gary D., 2006. "Toward a dual motive metaeconomic theory," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 35(4), pages 634-651, August.
    3. Diane P. Dupont, 2010. "Cost‐Sharing Incentive Programs for Source Water Protection: The Grand River's Rural Water Quality Program," Canadian Journal of Agricultural Economics/Revue canadienne d'agroeconomie, Canadian Agricultural Economics Society/Societe canadienne d'agroeconomie, vol. 58(4), pages 481-496, December.
    4. Ribaudo, Marc & Delgado, Jorge & Hansen, LeRoy T. & Livingston, Michael J. & Mosheim, Roberto & Williamson, James M., 2011. "Nitrogen in Agricultural Systems: Implications for Conservation Policy," Economic Research Report 118022, United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service.
    5. Lynne, Gary D., 1995. "Modifying The Neo-Classical Approach To Technology Adoption With Behavioral Science Models," Journal of Agricultural and Applied Economics, Southern Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 27(1), pages 1-14, July.
    6. Maria & Irham & Slamet Hartono & Lestari Rahayu Waluyati, 2022. "The effect of environmental awareness on motivation in adopting farming conservation techniques in the various agro-ecological zones: a case study in critical land of Java Island, Indonesia," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 24(2), pages 1878-1896, February.
    7. Lynch, Lori & Hardie, Ian W. & Parker, Douglas D., 2002. "Analyzing Agricultural Landowners' Willingness To Install Streamside Buffers," Working Papers 28570, University of Maryland, Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics.
    8. Lijing Gao & J. Arbuckle, 2022. "Examining farmers’ adoption of nutrient management best management practices: a social cognitive framework," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 39(2), pages 535-553, June.
    9. Diane P. Dupont, 2009. "Cost-sharing Incentive Programs for Source Water Protection: The Grand River’s Rural Water Quality Program," Working Papers 0905, Brock University, Department of Economics, revised Jun 2009.
    10. Mzoughi, Naoufel, 2011. "Farmers adoption of integrated crop protection and organic farming: Do moral and social concerns matter?," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(8), pages 1536-1545, June.
    11. Jean McGuire & Lois Morton & Alicia Cast, 2013. "Reconstructing the good farmer identity: shifts in farmer identities and farm management practices to improve water quality," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 30(1), pages 57-69, March.
    12. François J Dessart & Jesús Barreiro-Hurlé & René van Bavel, 2019. "Behavioural factors affecting the adoption of sustainable farming practices: a policy-oriented review," European Review of Agricultural Economics, Oxford University Press and the European Agricultural and Applied Economics Publications Foundation, vol. 46(3), pages 417-471.
    13. Hand, Michael S. & Nickerson, Cynthia J., 2009. "The Role of Cost-Share Rates and Prices on the Size of Conservation Investments in EQIP," 2009 Annual Meeting, July 26-28, 2009, Milwaukee, Wisconsin 49257, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    14. Aaron Thompson & Adam Reimer & Linda Prokopy, 2015. "Farmers’ views of the environment: the influence of competing attitude frames on landscape conservation efforts," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 32(3), pages 385-399, September.
    15. Czap, Natalia V. & Czap, Hans J. & Lynne, Gary D. & Burbach, Mark E., 2015. "Walk in my shoes: Nudging for empathy conservation," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 118(C), pages 147-158.
    16. Clément, Valérie & Moureau, Nathalie & Vidal, Marion, 2009. "À la recherche des biens sous tutelle," L'Actualité Economique, Société Canadienne de Science Economique, vol. 85(4), pages 383-401, décembre.
    17. Ioanna Grammatikopoulou & Eija Pouta & Sami Myyrä, 2016. "Exploring the determinants for adopting water conservation measures. What is the tendency of landowners when the resource is already at risk?," Journal of Environmental Planning and Management, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 59(6), pages 993-1014, June.
    18. Czap, Natalia V. & Czap, Hans J. & Khachaturyan, Marianna & Lynne, Gary D. & Burbach, Mark, 2012. "Walking in the shoes of others: Experimental testing of dual-interest and empathy in environmental choice," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 41(5), pages 642-653.
    19. Lynne, Gary D. & Casey, C. Franklin, 1998. "Regulation of technology adoption when individuals pursue multiple utility," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 27(6), pages 701-719.
    20. Inman, Alex & Winter, Michael & Wheeler, Rebecca & Vrain, Emilie & Lovett, Andrew & Collins, Adrian & Jones, Iwan & Johnes, Penny & Cleasby, Will, 2018. "An exploration of individual, social and material factors influencing water pollution mitigation behaviours within the farming community," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 16-26.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • Q25 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Renewable Resources and Conservation - - - Water
    • Q28 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Renewable Resources and Conservation - - - Government Policy

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:uwp:landec:v:87:y:2011:iii:1:p:433-452. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://le.uwpress.org/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.