UMD Theses and Dissertations

Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/3

New submissions to the thesis/dissertation collections are added automatically as they are received from the Graduate School. Currently, the Graduate School deposits all theses and dissertations from a given semester after the official graduation date. This means that there may be up to a 4 month delay in the appearance of a given thesis/dissertation in DRUM.

More information is available at Theses and Dissertations at University of Maryland Libraries.

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Author: search.filters.author.Boone, HannahSubject: search.filters.subject.outreach

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    Using behavior change and social-ecological frameworks to inform riparian forest buffer outreach in the Maryland Upper Potomac watershed
    (2019) Boone, Hannah; Pavao-Zuckerman, Mitchell; Environmental Science and Technology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    Land in the Maryland Upper Potomac watershed is predominantly privately held. Watershed restoration efforts seek to improve water quality through the implementation of riparian forest buffers. However, those efforts rely on aggregated actions of the individuals within the watershed, and adoption rates for the past decade have been below annual targets. An understanding of outreach strategies that promote riparian forest buffer adoption in a complex social-ecological system is needed. Employing qualitative methods, we integrated social-ecological and behavior change frameworks to better understand riparian forest buffer outreach and adoption in the Maryland Upper Potomac watershed. We conducted nineteen interviews with key stakeholders, followed by a quantification of main findings through landowner and practitioner questionnaires. Findings demonstrate that there is no “one size fits all” strategy. Rather, riparian forest buffer outreach needs interpersonal connections between landowners and practitioners to build trust and account for context-specific ecological feedbacks. There is opportunity to further reinforce riparian forest buffers through activities that demonstrate and leverage norms, impacting adoption through social feedbacks.