Agricultural Colonization and Ecological Destruction

人类活动最显著地改变 近年来，地球仪的自然环境条件发生了变化， 几十年来，大面积的热带雨林遭到破坏， 雨林 亚马逊河流域数百万英亩的土地已经被清理， 南美洲. 相当多的学术注意力集中在 生物，大气和水文影响的加速 森林砍伐，但相对较少的研究已经进行， 确定并了解亚马逊居民的态度 热带雨林和它们开垦土地的过程 个人和团体的成员。 该项目将包括一个 进行试点研究，以完善调查工具，并将提供初步的 结果，以促进完善的假设，为更大的研究， 热带雨林居民的态度和行动 厄瓜多尔东北部的苏昆比奥斯省。 调查将在 采访了大约400户家庭。 这些测试将 确定收集描述性信息的最有效方法 关于人口和经济特征和土地-和 定居者的资源使用做法;他们还将改进方法， 有效地收集有关家庭对以下问题的态度的信息： 目前的状况和未来的期望，资源的可获得性， 以及影响个人的制度和社会因素 活动 除了完善数据收集能力外， 试验调查的结果将用于改进一个模型， 与社会和生态过程有关。 该项目将在 与国家发展委员会协调， 厄瓜多尔政府。 该项目将显着提高我们对 特定调查和访谈方法在环境中的功效 比如厄瓜多尔东北部。 更重要的是，它将提供一种手段 收集有关这些特征的有价值的信息 定居者正在清除大片的热带雨林， 导致他们这样做的观念和态度。 的 因此，这项研究的更广泛意义将与 尊重我们对人们如何重视和使用 自然资源，以及我们对自然资源的了解 社会和经济进程促成了巨大变化， 在自然环境中。

One of the processes by which human activity has most dramatically altered natural environmental conditions across the globe in recent decades has been the destruction of large tracts of tropical rainforest. Millions of acres have been cleared in the Amazon basin of South America. Considerable scholarly attention has focused on the biological, atmospheric, and hydrological ramifications of accelerated deforestation, but relatively little research has been conducted to identify and understand the attitudes that residents of the Amazon have toward the rainforests and the processes by which they clear land individually and as members of groups. This project will consist of a pilot study to refine survey instruments and will provide preliminary results to facilitate refinement of hypotheses for a larger study of the attitudes and actions of rainforest residents rainforest in the Sucumbios province of northeastern Ecuador. Surveys will be tested in interviews with members of roughly 400 households. These tests will determine the most effective means of gathering descriptive information about the demographic and economic characteristics and the land- and resource-use practices of settlers; they also will refine methods for effectively eliciting information about household attitudes regarding current status and future aspirations, the availability of resources, and the institutional and societal factors affecting individual activities. In addition to refining data gathering capabilities, results from the trial surveys will be used to improve a model that relates social and ecological processes. The project will be conducted in coordination with the Consejo Nacional de Desarrollo, an agency of the Ecuador government. This project will significantly improve our knowledge of the efficacy of specific surveying and interviewing approaches in settings like northeastern Ecuador. More importantly, it will provide a means for gathering valuable information about the characteristics of settlers who are clearing large tracts of tropical rainforest and the perceptions and attitudes that lead them to act in that way. The broader significance of this research therefore will be felt both with respect to our general understandings of how people value and use natural resourcesand also in our improved knowledge about of the ways in which social and economic processes contribute to dramatic changes in the natural environment.